


There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven

by Colonel_Arbuckle



Category: Zootopia (2016)
Genre: Christianity, Comedy, Drama, F/M, Family, Flying, Friendship, God's Love, Marriage, Military, Police, Romance, Slice of Life
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2018-08-16
Updated: 2018-09-03
Packaged: 2019-06-28 02:26:30
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 9
Words: 60,984
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/15698229
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Colonel_Arbuckle/pseuds/Colonel_Arbuckle
Summary: A series of loosely connected slice-of-life oneshots of varying lengths following Nick, Judy, and her older brother both during and after the events of the film. Eventual WildeHopps. Some stories will be light and humorous, others will be quite deep and emotional. Because this is a slice-of-life project, I thought the phrase from Ecclesiastes 3:1 would make for an appropriate title. The first eight chapters are copied directly from the original post on fanfiction.net.





	1. Talking Points Memo

Talking Points Memo

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! So like I said in the summary, this is going to be a collection of loosely connected slice-of-life oneshots of varying lengths following Nick, Judy, and her older brother both during and after the events of the film. I want to emphasize both “loosely connected” and “varying lengths.” By “loosely connected,” I mean that all of these oneshots will take place in the same universe and in the order that they are presented, but there is not one underlying plot, so there are gaps in time between the oneshots and certain significant events might be explained briefly to fill what would otherwise be a plot hole, but will not be examined in detail. By “varying lengths,” I mean that I will not be limiting myself on word count in any way whatsoever, so one oneshot could be as short as a drabble, while the next could stand to be broken up into a multi-chapter story.

There’s also some headcanon (I think I’m using the term properly) I would like to explain before we get started. First, the world of Zootopia is a world that is, geopolitically speaking, very similar to our own. One of the implications of this, is that Zootopia is a big city within the United States of America. By extension, all real world nations and real world US states will retain their real world names in these oneshots, though I have a plan for a oneshot a little further down the road in which I will create a fictional country, solely for the purpose of not providing direct commentary on current, real world political/military situations. Also, I have chosen to place the city of Zootopia in the real world location of Knob Noster, Missouri and the town of Bunnyburrow in southern Iowa. I have specific reasons for these locations, but I don’t think it’s necessary to explain them here. These reasons will probably become evident as I release more of these oneshots, but if you are really curious, feel free to ask me and I would be more than happy to explain. Actually, if you have any questions about anything that you read in my stories, I encourage you to ask me. Even though Knob Noster is landlocked, I imagine the real world Blackwater River that runs just a few miles north to be altered to become the body of water we see surrounding Zootopia in the film. In my mind, Kansas City still exists, but because Zootopia is so much bigger, it dominates the region politically and becomes the home of Kansas City’s major league sports teams. With regard to sentience/anthropomorphism, food, and who eats what, the only sentient/anthropomorphic beings are land based mammals (not bats, whales, etc.) and thus predators eat seafood and birds (chicken, turkey, etc.) on a regular basis.

This first oneshot is set during the film on the evening prior to Judy’s meeting with Mayor Bellwether and Chief Bogo regarding becoming the public face of the ZPD. This oneshot sort of has two sections. The first section is based on my initial thoughts when I first saw Judy connect the savagery to predator biology. When I first saw this section in the film, my first thought was, “No! No! You’re analyzing! You’re speculating! You’re not supposed to do that! That’s Bill O’Reilly’s job, not yours!” So I used the Talking Points Memo segment from The O’Reilly Factor as a tool to expand on that premise. The second section is largely designed to introduce y’all to Judy’s older brother, the oldest of the Hopps children, Captain Peter “Pistol” Hopps, United States Air Force.

The O’Reilly Factor, Rasmussen Reports, NASCAR, Duck Commander, Ducky Dynasty, and Zootopia all belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Finally, I would like to dedicate this series of oneshots to the memory of Brent Thompson, Michael Krol, Patrick Zamarripa, Mike Smith and Lorne Ahrens. They were all Dallas police officers who were killed in the line of duty by a racist sniper on the day I started writing this first oneshot, the 7th of July 2016. There death is a reminder of the risks police officers take every day when they put on their uniform and step out the door to keep us safe.

Well, I’ve talked y’alls ear off long enough. I tend to ramble sometimes when I’m writing. Let’s get to what you really came here for: the first story in There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven! Enjoy!

#

It was nearly 7 in the evening when Judy finally made it back to her apartment. She had stayed at the office later than usual trying to finish up the mountain of paperwork that had resulted from the missing mammal case. The keyword here was TRYING. Bogo had been heading out the door himself when he found her still slaving away at her desk and had ordered her to go home. She had protested, but the cape buffalo was just as stubborn as she was, so she found herself following her boss down the front steps of the precinct, promising herself that she would definitely, absolutely, without a doubt, get that paperwork done tomorrow.

As she walked down the hallway toward her apartment, she was flipping through her keys, trying to find the one to her apartment door, when her fingers slipped and the keys fell to the hardwood floor in front of her. The rabbit sighed. Another screw up. It felt like she had been making a lot of those lately, though to be fair, this one paled in comparison to the one she had made a few days ago. At least this one didn’t damage species relations across the country.

She finally found the right key, slid it into the deadbolt, and unlocked the door with a slight click. As she stepped into her apartment, she groaned as she heard the familiar sounds of her next door neighbors arguing again. She flipped on the small TV she had set up a few days ago on the small table across from the foot of her bed to drown them out. It was almost time for her favorite news program anyway, so Judy tuned the TV to the Fox News Channel [Well that was easy. A real world entity already using a name that would be a pun in the film.] in anticipation of The O’Rhino Factor. She watched the program with her parents almost every night when she lived back home, so it was a comfort knowing her folks were watching the same thing she was at the same time. Plus, it was nice to have an escape from local news (for obvious reasons at the moment) and hear about what was going on across the rest of the country.

“The O’Rhino Factor is on! Tonight: ” Judy tuned out Bill O’Rhino’s preview of that night’s program as she pulled a TV dinner out of her mini-fridge and popped it in the microwave. Thirty seconds later, the microwave went off with a ding, she pulled her meal out, and she walked over to and sat down at the head of her bed, propped up against the wall behind her pillow, with her food in her lap. The theme music was just ending and she began to pay a little bit of attention to the TV, but her focus was still mostly directed at saying grace, stabbing at her meal with her fork, and getting the first few bites in her mouth.

“Hi, I’m Bill O’Rhino, thanks for watching us tonight,” the commentator greeted with a smile before his face turned serious. “The Media, the Police, and Press Conferences; that is the subject of this evening’s Talking Points Memo.”

Judy’s full, undivided attention immediately shot from the supper in her lap to the commentator on the TV screen in front of her. “Oh no.”

Bill continued. “When I first began working in television journalism in the 1970s, the reporting was, by and large, objective. Yes, most of the nightly news anchors at the big three networks maintained liberal viewpoints in their personal lives, but they kept their bias off the air, reporting only hard news every night. However, as time went on, the big three networks, ZNN, and we here at Fox News began devoting segments and eventually whole programs to something other than hard news: commentary and analysis. Now, there is nothing inherently wrong with that. It is beneficial for the American people to hear the perspectives of various personalities on such things as national security affairs, economic matters, and social issues. Indeed, this very program is a commentary program. The problem arises when the line between the two becomes blurred, and that is what has happened in the mainstream media. As commentary and analysis began to receive higher and higher ratings, the hard news anchors wanted in on the game as well. They began presenting personal opinions and their own analysis as established fact. In fact, it is now almost impossible to watch a program labeled as hard news by the mainstream media without hearing the anchor’s liberal bias, and this has directly lead to the American people’s distrust of the media. Case in point: a Rasmoussen Poll was released today which asked ‘How credible do you find the television news media?’”

The shot of Bill O’Rhino’s head and upper body was replaced with a graphic displaying the results of the poll. “As you can see, only 28% of responders combined said ‘Very Credible’ or ‘Somewhat Credible.’”

The graphic was removed and Bill O’Rhino’s image returned to the screen. “Now, none of what I’ve just said is news to regular Factor viewers. We’ve documented countless examples of this bias in the past. But now, it is possible that this false equivalency between fact and opinion could be starting to damage the credibility of other respected American institutions, such as law enforcement. For instance, let’s look at the crime story that has taken the nation by storm in recent days: the missing mammal case out in Zootopia, Missouri.”

Judy sighed. “I knew it.” She sure wasn’t going to get an escape from local news tonight.

Bill continued. “When the fourteen savage mammals were found a few days ago, the police department in Zootopia held a press conference to update the public on the situation. We here at Fox News carried that press conference live. One of the officers who spoke at that press conference was the officer who found the mammals, a rabbit by the name of Judy Hopps. Officer Hopps did not speak for long at the press conference, but what she did say may have caused some serious damage. Roll the tape.”

The image of Bill O’Rhino was replaced by a clip now all too familiar to Judy: her at the podium in the lobby of ZPD’s Precint 1. “So, predators are the only ones going savage?” a sheep reporter asked her.

The image of her on screen hesitated a moment before replying, “That is ac… Yes, that is accurate. Yes.”

A pig reporter yelled out from the crowd, “Why? Why is this happening?”

“We still don’t know,” the on screen Judy admitted. The reporters all began murmuring. Now feeling very nervous and fearing she was losing their confidence, she continued, “But, uh… it may have something to do with biology.”

“What do you mean by that?” the sheep reporter probed.

“A biological component,” she explained. “You know, something in their DNA.”

“In their DNA? Can you elaborate on that, please?” a third reporter questioned.

“Yes, what I mean is, thousands of years ago… uh, predators survived through their aggressive… hunting instincts. For whatever reason… they seem to be reverting back to their primitive savage ways.”

The reporters began murmuring again before a fourth one called out, “Officer Hopps, could it happen again?”

Beginning to feel a little more confident, she answered, “It is possible. So we must be vigilant. And we at the ZPD are prepared and are here to protect you.”

The clip ended abruptly and the image of Bill O’Rhino returned. “Officer Hopps’s responsibility was to lay out the facts of the case. However, by telling a national television audience that predators MAY be going savage due to biological reasons, she was no longer stating facts. She was speculating and providing analysis. And that’s my job.” He said the last sentence with a smile before his serious expression returned. “This is very dangerous. The American people look to law enforcement as an unbiased institution that treats and judges the populous fairly, but what are they to think after seeing that?” He paused. “Talking Points also disagrees with Officer Hopps’s analysis. It is quite unlikely that the reason that the mammals are going savage is genetic in nature, especially since there is no record in medical history of this ever happening before and even now it is only happening in one city. There are no reports of anything like this happening anywhere else in the nation. So, if her theory is so easily disproven, why did Officer Hopps present it to the country? Well, Talking Points has a theory. Roll the tape.”

Bill O’Rhino was replaced on screen by another clip. This one was part of the cell phone footage she had recorded in the asylum where the mammals had been held. “Because I got a dozen and a half animals here who have gone off-the-rails crazy and you can’t tell me why! Now I’d call that awfully far from ‘doing everything,’” Lionheart yelled at one of his doctors.

The doctor replied, “Sir, it may be time to consider their biology.”

“What? What do you mean ‘biology?!’” Lionheart roared.

“The only animals going savage are predators,” the doctor explained. “We cannot keep it a secret. We need to come forward.”

“Hmm. Great idea,” Lionheart thought out loud. “Tell the public. And how do you think they’re gonna feel about their mayor WHO IS A LION?!”

The clip ended and Bill O’Rhino returned to the screen. “What you just saw was cell phone footage taken by Officer Hopps in the facility where the mammals were secretly being held. As you can see, one of the doctors who had been attempting to find a cure posited the same theory as Officer Hopps. But this still doesn’t paint a complete picture. We need to know a little bit more about Officer Hopps herself. Talking Points has discovered that Officer Hopps is very inexperienced, having only graduated from the Zootopia Police Academy less than a month ago and she has only been on the force for a week and a half. In fact, this missing mammal case was her first case as an officer. She received no official training in conducting a press conference prior to taking the podium. Talking Points believes that Officer Hopps was simply very nervous, and was struggling to provide intelligent sounding answers, so she elaborated on a theory that she had heard from a relatively credible source. Now, on the flip side, many in the liberal precincts have accused Officer Hopps and the entire Zootopia Police Department of being speciesist against predators. This is, of course, nonsense, for the reasons previously mentioned as well as the facts that the Zootopia Police Department is a majority predator department and Officer Hopps turned to a civilian fox for assistance in tracking down the missing mammals.”

Judy’s eyes began to water at the mention of Nick.

Bill O’Rhino shook his head and sighed before concluding, “Talking Points is confident that the truth will come out in due course and all of this will be put to bed, but in the meantime, the damage has been done. And that’s the memo. Now for our Top Story, with reaction, syndicated columnist Charles Cat-hammer-”

Click.

Judy lowered the remote control to the bed beside her and stared at the now blank TV screen. After a few moments, she sighed and moved her unfinished supper from her lap to the nightstand beside her, having lost her appetite. The nearly full plastic tray served as yet another reminder of how the fallout from the press conference was really beginning to take its toll on her, both mentally and physically. She had skipped lunch today and breakfast the day prior, so she had probably lost a few pounds she didn’t need to lose. At night, she was constantly being awoken in fits and starts, so her sleep cycle had been disrupted too. She probably hadn’t gotten more than five hours of uninterrupted sleep since the press conference. She had tried her best to cover up the bags under her eyes with makeup, but she was pretty sure some of her coworkers had noticed how exhausted she was.

Yes, keeping this stress bottled up was slowly robbing her of her health. She needed to talk to somebody about all of this. She needed to vent. But who could she talk to? Her parents? No, they’d probably just tell her it was too much for her and that she needed to come home. Someone at the precinct? No, she hadn’t been working there long enough to get to know anyone well enough to talk to about something like this. Even Ben, friendly as the cheetah was, probably wouldn’t be much help. The only other person she knew in this city, the only one she really trusted was… Nick. She groaned as she put her paws over her eyes and the tears began running down her face. Why had she been so stupid? Why had she screwed up the only friendship she had? Why? Why? She sat like that for a few minutes, letting the tears fall, wallowing in her depression.

But then, suddenly, she sat bolt upright. Of course! She knew exactly who she could talk to, and she needed to call him right now! Why hadn’t she thought of this before?! She raced from her bed to her desk, grabbed her phone, and started dialing.

#

In the living room of a riverfront apartment on the eastern edge of Shrewport, Louisiana, three mammals wearing olive drab colored U.S. Air Force flight suits sat on the couch in front of the TV. On each of their right sleeves, just below the shoulder, they wore the patch of the 11th Bomb Squadron, a unit that flew B-52 Rhinofortresses out of nearby Barksdale AFB [Air Force Base] [Not a pun. That’s the real name of the real Air Force base near Shreveport, Louisiana.]. They were watching The O’Rhino Factor as well, which had just gone into its first commercial break. One of the pilots, a black sheep, spoke up.

“Wow, Pistol. Your sister really screwed up, didn’t she?” he chuckled as he directed his remark to the rabbit in the room.

“Can it, Shepard,” Captain Peter “Pistol” Hopps, USAF immediately snapped back. “It’s not funny. How would you feel if you had just been raked over the coals on national television?”

“Woah, woah, take it easy,” the sheep put up his hooves in mock surrender. “I was just making an observation. I’m sorry, I meant no offense.”

The rabbit sighed, releasing some of the tension that had been building in him over the past ten or so minutes. “No, I’m the one who should be apologizing. I shouldn’t have snapped at you like that. I’m sorry. It’s just that…” He sighed again. “It’s just that she’s my little sister, ya know? I worry about her. She’s wanted to be a cop since she was nine years old, and now that she’s reached her goal, I don’t want to see that ruined for her. I felt responsible for her when we were growing up, since we were the two oddball children who wanted to leave the farm behind. We both knew God was calling us to something different, but no one else in the family seemed to understand that, so we really only had each other for support. I guess I still feel responsible for her in a way,” he concluded.

“I get it man, I get it,” Shepard sympathized. “How far apart are you two? In age I mean.”

“She’s two years younger than me.”

“Mmm.” For a moment, the only sound in the room was the drone of the TV.

Pete turned to the other pilot in the room, an otter. “Hey, Ridley, ya got any Beeman’s?” He had a habit of chewing gum when he was stressed and the current situation was downright killing him.

“Yeah, I think I got me a stick,” the otter replied.

“Loan me some, will ya? I'll pay ya back later.”

“Fair enough,” Ridley pulled out a package of gum and handed a stick to Pete.

As the blue-eyed rabbit stuck the gum in his mouth, he suddenly felt something vibrating. Realizing it was his phone ringing, he unzipped the chest pocket of his flight suit, pulled it out, and answered it without checking who it was. “Hello?” he spoke around the gum.

“Hi Pete! How’s my favorite hotshot Air Force pilot brother doing?” a feminine voice asked from the other end.

“Hey Jude!” Pete responded with a smile. “I’m doing all right. How’s my favorite famous big city cop sister doing?” he asked, in an attempt to keep her spirits up. It didn’t really work.

“Well, at the moment, wishing she were a lot less famous,” Judy replied, the spark having left her voice.

Realizing that this was going to be a rather serious and private conversation and also not wanting to annoy the other two pilots who were trying to watch the Factor, Pete got up from the couch and walked over to his bedroom. “Now why is that?” he asked as he closed the bedroom door behind him. “You found 14 missing mammals in less than 48 hours. I’d think you’d be pretty proud of that,” he offered, trying to point out the positives. “Congratulations, by the way.”

“Thanks, I am proud of that, but…” She sighed. “Pete, I… I think I broke the country.”

Pete had to stifle a chortle as he plopped down in the desk chair that at the moment, was turned so that he was facing sideways at his desk. “Oh, I think you’re being a little too hard on yourself, Jude,” he replied. “There’s been conflict of varying degrees between the species ever since Cain killed Abel. You know that.”

“Well, yes, I know, but it’s not just that,” she continued. “I also let down my department. The media is calling the ZPD corrupt and speciesist, all because of me.”

“Sure they are. But that’s what they always do in cases like this,” he reminded her as his free paw found the Joey Liongano MASCAR [Mammalian Association for Stock Car Auto Racing] die-cast car that was sitting on his desk and began to absentmindedly roll the model back and forth across the wooden surface. “Anyone who can think for themselves knows that that’s complete nonsense. And not everyone in the media has bought into it. Did you see the Factor tonight?”

“Well, yes, that’s actually sort of what prompted me to call,” Another sigh. “Peter, I need you to be completely honest with me. Am… am *I* a speciesist?”

This time, a slight chortle did escape, but he quickly recovered. “Of course not! I agree with Bill’s analysis. No offense, but you never really were very good at public speaking. I mean, you did just get nervous, didn’t you?”

“Well, when I was actually standing at the podium making the statements I thought that’s all it was, but considering what happened right after, well… now I’m not so sure,” She dejectedly explained who Nick was and how he had helped her and especially how their conversation after the press conference had gone, her voice wavering the whole time as she tried to hold back the tears.

When she finished telling the story, there was a long pause before Pete finally reacted. “Well, it sounds to me…” He drug out the last word as he finished gathering his thoughts, “Like it’s really more of a simple misunderstanding. What I mean is, it sounds like you’ve both come to trust each other quite a bit, and in the time you’ve spent together, you’ve come to realize that despite the persona he puts on, that he’s actually a kind and gentle person. When he took your words at the podium at face value and felt that you violated his trust, he tested you by pretending to lunge at you. Now, this is out of character for him, because you know he would never hurt you, and because he was acting out of character, you didn’t know how to react. So your subconscious took over, and because your cheek got scratched up the last time a fox lunged at you, your subconscious unfortunately told you to defend yourself, so you reached for the repellant. Sound about right?”

She considered it for a moment. It WAS a plausible explanation. “Maybe,” she replied. “But regardless, he still had a right to be upset. I hurt him.”

“Yes, he did have a right to be upset because yes, you did hurt him. You made a mistake, but it’s not the end of the world. We’re all mammals, we all make mistakes. The important thing is that you recognize it and ask for his forgiveness,” Pete counseled.

“I know he’ll never f-forgive me,” she sobbed. The tears were starting to flow again. “And it wasn’t j-just any m-mistake, it was a serious m-mistake. I hurt a lot of people. In fact, I’m…” she paused, debating whether or not she should come out and say it. “I-I’m thinking of resigning!” she finally managed before she started bawling.

Crap. This conversation had just gone to a whole other level. Pete’s ears drooped as he turned to face his desk and set the die-cast car he had been playing with to the side before leaning his elbows on the wooden surface, now completely focused on giving his little sister the confidence to not throw her life away. “It’s okay, it’s okay. Let it out,” he comforted as she continued to bawl. After about five minutes, the wails he heard over the phone subsided to sobs and then to sniffles. He decided it was okay to continue. “Look, I know you’re upset, but you want to talk about serious mistakes? RESIGNING would be a serious mistake. You’ve known since you were a child that God was calling you to law enforcement.”

“But Pete,” she sniffed, “what if I didn’t know? What if I misunderstood God? What if it was nothing more than a childhood fantasy and I was just lying to myself the whole time?”

“Well, that’s always possible. I mean, anything’s possible. But I seriously doubt it, considering how well you did at the academy and how well you did on this case itself. Do you remember what Pastor Fluffton told us when we had that long conversation with him about God’s calling on our lives?” Pete was referring to their youth pastor back in Bunnyburrow. “He told us that when you’re facing a morally neutral decision, a good rule of thumb is to ask yourself, ‘Do I want to do it,’ ‘Am I good at it,’ and ‘Is there an open door to do it.’ He also said, if you can answer yes to all three questions, then there’s a pretty good chance God is pointing you in that direction. And, let’s see, you’ve wanted to do this since you were nine, you found fifteen missing mammals in two days, so you clearly EXCEL at it, and you’ve already got the job, so I think it’s pretty safe to say that you’re right smack in the center of God’s will. God’s given you an incredible gift, Judy, don’t waste it!” He realized as he finished that he had gotten progressively louder to the point where he was almost shouting and was probably intimidating his sister a little bit. His suspicions were confirmed when the only response he got was another sniffle.

He sighed, drew in a deep breath, and then sighed again, calming himself and choosing his next words very carefully. When he began again, it was almost in a whisper. “Jude, I can’t tell you whether you should resign or not. You’re an adult and you have to work that out between you and God, and I’ll definitely be praying for you, but let me just say this much. You. Are not. A speciesist. You’ve been fighting against prejudice your whole life. I remember Mom telling me during your senior year of high school how you fought for Gideon Gray’s right to run for student body president when the administration didn’t want predators to run. By the way, he never really thanked you for that, did he? Anyway, you are one of the kindest and most caring people I know, Judy. Don’t ever let anyone tell you different. Please Jude, please don’t let one mistake define your life.” There was a long pause, and Pete was starting to worry that his words had fallen on long, deaf ears, until finally he heard a sigh and:

“Thanks. I needed that.”

A relieved smile spread its way across Pete’s face and his ears perked up again, “Of course. And I meant every word.”

“I’ve vented to you enough. How’s life treating you?” she asked. They hadn’t spoken since her graduation from the academy a few weeks ago, which was a long time for the two tight-knit siblings.

“Oh, pretty good. The scheduler’s been having our crew flying quite a bit recently, so I haven’t been doing as much desk work, which is awesome. Um, let’s see… what else? Oh! I’m heading out to West Mongooseroe with a few of the guys from the squadron next weekend to see the Duck Commander shop,” They were both fans of Duck Dynasty, so he knew this would get a reaction out of her, though he wasn’t sure precisely what sort of reaction.

“On second thought, maybe you’d better stop talking,” she sneered playfully. “You’re making me jealous.”

Yep, he was right. He chuckled before replying with a smile, “I’ll be sure to get some autographs for you.”

“Oh, that’d be great! Thanks!” He could tell her face was lighting up. He was pleased to hear her genuinely smile for the first time in this conversation. “I’ll pay you back for the postage.”

Perfect. Now to spring the good news on her. “Why bother?” he smiled. “I can just hand them to you when I see you in eight months.”

“What’s going on in eight months?” she asked, puzzled.

“Well, eight months from today… is my report-no-later-than date to the 55th Bomb Squadron,” he explained.

“You’re getting assigned to Foxchild?!” she squealed. She was referring to Foxchild AFB, a base located a couple of miles south of Zootopia which just so happened to be the only other base in the entire U.S. Air Force besides Barksdale that operated B-52s. Well, except for special circumstances like deployments or theater security packages or whatnot. It would probably be better to say that those were the only two bases that PERMANENTLY hosted B-52s. It was partially for these reasons (both the fact that the units on base flew B-52s and that it was the closest Air Force base both to Zootopia and to Bunnyburrow) that had caused him to request the B-52 upon his completion of pilot training. Unfortunately, he had been sent to Barksdale for his first operational assignment, but now after three years the Air Force was sending him exactly where he wanted to go.

“Yep,” grinned Pete, “The squadron commander pulled me into his office this morning and told me.”

“That’s awesome! It’ll be great having you so close.”

“Absolutely,” he replied. “You’ll have to give me a tour of the city when I get there and introduce me to all your friends, especially Nick.”

“If he’ll ever speak to me again,” muttered Judy as the smile fell from her face.

“I’m sure you’ll be able to patch things up with him,” encouraged Pete. “Based on what you told me, it sounds like he’s a great guy. I’m sure he’ll understand if you just explain what happened.”

“From your lips to God’s ears,” she sighed. “Well, it’s getting late, so I’ll let you go. Thanks for taking my call. I really needed someone to talk to.”

“Don’t give it a second thought, Jude. You call me any time you need to and like I said, I’ll be praying for you, both about your job and Nick.”

“Thanks. Well, goodnight Captain Hopps.”

“Goodnight Officer Hopps.”

Back in her apartment, Judy disconnected the call and set the phone down on her desk. She sighed. She had a lot of thinking to do. And a lot of praying.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! Even though in this story it sounds like Pete convinced Judy to stay with the force, the way I imagine it, the prospect of her being rewarded (potentially becoming the face of the ZPD) as a result of her actions instead of receiving a punishment was the final straw that undid most of what Pete said and prompted her to resign as we see in the film.

At the moment, I have plans for about ten more stories for you to look forward to and I’m hoping I can write the next two stories a lot quicker than I did this one. Two months for 5000 some-odd words is a bit much, but it was a busy summer (leadership camp, vacation, the Olympics, etc.) and in my mind the next two stories are shorter than this one (of course this one was originally a lot shorter in my mind too, so we’ll see how that goes). So until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them and may God bless you all!


	2. Don't React Well to Bullets

Don’t React Well to Bullets

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! I want to start by thanking everyone who favorited and followed this story and especially Teenylambofgod and bagnome for reviewing. It means a lot that you took the time to do so.

Well, it took longer than I had hoped, but I finally finished the second installment. Before we dive into it, I’ve listed below my headcannon regarding the various uniforms of the ZPD, just so I don’t have to describe what characters are wearing as we move further into this series. It is not meant to be a complete, comprehensive list, as if it was pulled from the pages of the ZPD regulations, but rather a guide to help you better understand what I’m referring to.

Class A – uniform worn by ZPD Academy graduates in the film; blue long sleeve dress shirt with necktie and blue dress pants; if headgear is worn, it will be the ZPD service cap (the caps being held by the graduates in the film); earned aiguillettes (shoulder cords), if any, will be worn around the left shoulder; earned award ribbons, if any, will be worn on the right chest above the name tag; this is the only uniform on which aiguillettes and/or ribbons are worn; intended for wear at formal functions such as Academy graduations

Class B – uniform worn by most of the on duty officers throughout the film; long sleeve dress shirt with necktie and blue dress pants; if headgear is worn, it will be the ZPD service cap; intended for wear in an office setting, but may be worn on patrol at the individual officer’s discretion

Class C – uniform worn by Chief Bogo throughout the film; short sleeve dress shirt without necktie and blue tactical pants; if headgear is worn, it will be the ZPD service cap or the ZPD baseball cap (solid blue with the ZPD badge embroidered in white on the front); intended for wear in an office setting or on patrol

Class D – uniform worn by Judy throughout most of the film; black tactical vest with bulletproof lining worn over a light blue long sleeve shirt with stand-up collar and dark blue pants; if headgear is worn, it will be the ZPD baseball cap, unless being worn while on parking duty; if being worn while on parking duty, will be augmented with orange reflective vest and blue alternate service cap; intended for wear while outside an office setting

PTU (Physical Training Uniform) - navy blue shorts, lightish blue/grayish shirt with “ZPD” screen-printed in white across the front; if headgear is worn, it will be the ZPD baseball cap; navy blue work-out jacket with the ZPD badge screen-printed in white on the left chest and navy blue work-out pants may be worn in cold weather

This story technically takes place during the movie, during Nick’s time at the Academy.

Zootopia belongs to Disney. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

#

It had been about a month since Nicholas Wilde had begun his tenure as a cadet at the Zootopia Police Academy, and so far he was really enjoying the experience. Up to this point, all of their training had been in the classroom, and though he wasn’t a straight-A student and never would be, the material was interesting and he managed to make decent enough grades to continue his training. And it was a good thing too, because now they were getting to the really good stuff. They had spent an hour on the firing range yesterday, getting a feel for the ZPD’s standard issue 9 mm sidearm, and today they were going to put that familiarization to use in their first practical training exercise outside of the classroom.

Nick had had a hard time getting to sleep the night before, but you could barely tell by looking at him as he walked across the campus towards the Academy’s main auditorium the next morning with a few of the other cadets in his class. No, he wasn’t giddy and jumping up and down with excitement (that was more Judy’s bit), but there were brief moments as he conversed with his fellow cadets when his inner excitement would break through his otherwise calm, cool, and collected persona. As he walked through the heavy metal doors and into the large lecture hall where the mission briefing would be given, he was greeted by a sea of black and blue Class D uniforms identical to his own and a hundred different conversations carrying on at once. He and his friends found a few empty seats in the back of the room and sat, waiting for their drill instructor to arrive. They didn’t have to wait long.

“ROOM, TENCH-HUT!” boomed the cadet who had been selected to stand watch at the door down at the front of the auditorium.

The room immediately became silent as all conversations ceased and the cadets sprung to their feet and stood at the position of attention. Because he was near the back of the room, Nick was able to cheat a little bit and move his eyes to watch the front door while keeping the rest of his head facing straight forward. A few moments later, he watched as their polar bear drill instructor walked in, wearing her PTUs, followed close behind by a Kodiak bear wearing Class Bs. Nick recognized him as the superintendent of the Academy, though he couldn’t remember his name off the top of his head. Shelican, maybe? Shelicar… something like that. Oh well, it wasn’t important.

“At ease. Be seated,” the bear-who’s-name-could-not-be-recalled ordered and the cadets took their seats once again.

“What’s Captain Shelikof doing here?” the cadet next to Nick whispered. Nick shrugged. Shelikof. Well, he was close.

“I won’t take up too much of your time,” Captain Shelikof began from behind the podium at the front of the room, “But before I turn you over to Sergeant Dawson this morning, I just want to take a few moments to congratulate each of you on making it this far. You’ve demonstrated that you can understand and retain knowledge necessary to perform well as a keeper of the peace. Now you will begin to be tested where it really counts: in the field. You may have been wondering why you all have been given the rest of the day off after the exercise this morning. Let me explain. This exercise is the toughest exercise you will face while at the Academy, both physically and psychologically. Especially psychologically. I’ll be completely honest with you. It’s designed to give you a taste of what’s to come with the idea that some of you will weed yourselves out. To make some of you quit. You will not be required to pass this test when you take it this morning. In fact, only one person in the history of this Academy has ever passed it on her first try.”

Nick had a pretty good idea he knew who Shelikof was talking about.

“However, it is the most serious and most critical mission we train for as a department, a mission that makes us unique among the vast majority of departments in the country, and you WILL be required to pass before you graduate. After today, you will have two more opportunities to attempt this exercise, and it will be up to you to schedule them when you feel that you are ready. You’ve all come this far; don’t let yourself down now. I wish you all Godspeed. Sergeant Dawson?” he turned to the drill instructor as he finished. The polar bear stood from the seat she had taken on the front row and took the Captain’s place behind the podium as the Kodiak bear took the chair she had been occupying a few moments before.

“Thank you, Captain Shelikof,” Dawson began. “Lights please.” The cadet sitting next to the light switch reached up and turned out the lights. Dawson picked up a little remote from atop the podium and pressed a button to advance the slide show displayed on the projector screen behind her, which until this point had been showing a completely black slide. This slide was now replaced with an image of what looked to be a miniature airplane, much too small to fit a pilot (probably a drone), with an intake for a jet engine on the top of and towards the rear of the fuselage, painted white with “USAF” and “ALCM” on the side.

“Captain Shelikof mentioned a moment ago that the exercise you are about to attempt is the most critical mission we train for,” Dawson continued. “Well, this is the reason why,” she explained as she pointed her thumb over her shoulder at the screen behind her. “Can anyone tell me what this little item on the screen is?” A few hands went up. “Yes, Cadet Haymire?” The hands dropped and a horse stood up as required to deliver the answer.

“It is an AGM-86, commonly known as the Air Launched Cruise Missile. It is maintained by the United States Air Force for use as a stand-off weapon from B-52 strategic bombers.”

Huh, Cadet Teacher’s Pet had been reading a little bit ahead. As usual.

“Correct,” Dawson confirmed as the horse sat back down. “Specifically, you are looking at the B model of the AGM-86. Does anyone know what is so special about the B model?” This time, only Haymire’s hoof went up. “Anyone else?” Sergeant Dawson asked hopefully. She sighed. “Go ahead, Haymire.” The horse stood once again.

“The B model of the AGM-86 carries the W80 thermonuclear warhead.”

Show off.

“Right again,” the polar bear replied as the horse sat back down again. Nick figured the guy probably didn’t need to bother with going to the gym for leg workouts, considering how many squats he was doing in the classroom.

“As some of you may or may not know,” Dawson explained, “Zootopia is one of the few cities and towns in America to be privileged to have a military base nearby.” She clicked the button on the remote, and the slide advanced to a satellite photo of Foxchild AFB. “Foxchild AFB is one of five Air Force bases charged with conducting the nuclear deterrence mission. It is one of only two that conducts this mission with the B-52 Rhinofortress. As a result, there are hundreds, if not thousands of B model AGM-86s locked up in heavily fortified storage facilities on the base. Air Force Security Forces, being responsible for the security of the base itself, are responsible for maintaining positive control of these weapons. However, we ARE talking about nukes here, so the Air Force is always trying to prepare for every possible contingency. And that’s where you come in.” She advanced the slide once more, this time showing an image of what looked to be the interior of one of the aforementioned storage facilities. It was a large, square building, about the size of a small aircraft hangar, with row after row of cruise missiles stacked in groups of three on pallets. The picture was taken from one corner of the room.

“Several years ago,” Dawson continued, “An Air Force think tank was charged with thinking of and creating solutions for problems that could arise concerning nuclear weapons. One of the specific scenarios they laid out, was the possibility of Security Forces becoming incapacitated in some manner and an enemy combatant or combatants gaining access to the warheads. Their solution: train local police departments in the art of nuclear weapons security so that they can provide assistance to Security Forces if necessary.” Dawson motioned up towards the screen behind her. “What you are looking at here, is the inside of our Nuclear Weapons Security Training Facility, or NWSTF, pronounced ‘now-stiff.’ It was designed with the assistance of the Air Force’s 5th Bomb Wing, the host unit at Foxchild, and it closely models their storage facilities, with the classified elements removed. This is where you will be conducting today’s exercise.”

It was at this point that Captain Shelikof looked down at his phone and immediately got up from his seat on the front row and moved toward the exit, putting his phone to his ear and nodding briefly at Dawson as he went. Dawson acknowledged him with a nod of her own as she seamlessly continued the briefing. Nick was surprised, but also quite pleased by how calm she was being. Normally, she would be screaming at them and barking orders. It was a nice change of pace.

Then the door closed behind Shelikof.

“Now listen up cadets!” Dawson began screaming. “Because I’m only going to explain this once!

Never mind.

“This will be a simulation of the worst case scenario! An enemy combatant has successfully broken into a nuke storage site with the goal of detonating a nuclear warhead! Your mission is to singlehandedly enter the facility, locate the combatant, and take him down before he can set off the warhead! And if you fail, guess what?! YOU’LL BE DEAD! Along with the rest of Zootopia! Any questions?!” Nick was the only one to raise his paw. “What do ya got for me, Wilde?”

Nick stood. “Who’s playing the role of the enemy combatant?”

“Well, you’ll find out when you get in there, won’t ya?! Now, since your feeling so curious this morning, you’re up first,” she replied with a malicious grin. Then she turned her attention back to the entire class. “Everybody up, let’s go, we’re burning daylight!”

Nick sighed as the rest of the class stood and began to make their way to the front door of the auditorium and then out across the campus to the NWSTF.

#

Nick found himself standing just outside the entrance to the NWSTF, armed with what looked like the ZPD sidearm, but was actually only a training tool that shot a laser beam. It was programmed with a finite number of shots, just like the real firearm, and if the sensors in the facility determined that either he or his opponent, who was armed with the same weapon, was hit by the laser, they would be considered “dead” and the exercise over. By the same token, if one of their lasers happened to strike one of the missiles just right, well… suffice it to say the exercise would DEFINITELY be over.

Now that he thought about it, this was a lot like an advanced game of Laser Tag. Huh.

He took a few deep breaths, psyching himself up for the task at hand. The rest of his class was sitting on the lawn behind him, awaiting their turn. Sergeant Dawson, who stood beside him, began tapping her foot impatiently. “We don’t have all day Wilde,” she growled.

“Roger that, Teach,” he turned to face her with a smirk, as the sarcasm and wit he used so effectively as a defense mechanism rose to the surface. “Any last words of advice?”

Before she could answer, one of the other cadets, an elephant, called out, “Hey, Wilde, be careful what you shoot at, huh? Most things in here don’t react too well to bullets!”

“That sounds as good as any,” Dawson replied to Nick’s question.

“Right,” Nick muttered flatly. He took a few more breaths and then pushed the door open, beginning the exercise.

As he entered the building, an alarm sounded briefly, signaling his opponent that he had entered the building and they could begin working on the missile. Since he entered the building from near one of the corners, he was greeted with an almost identical image to what was displayed on the projector in the briefing earlier: row upon row of pallets stacked with missiles. The pallets were arranged in a square, so that there were ten rows and ten columns.

If there was any aspect of this exercise where he had the advantage, it would be that all of his attention would be focused on stopping the enemy, while his opponent would have to split their attention between laying down their own cover fire and working on the missile they had selected to simulate the process of accessing, arming, and ultimately detonating the weapon. His goal was to apprehend the enemy before they could cross the final two wires to complete the ignition circuit, triggering the “explosion.” Simple really.

Nick thought through his strategy. His first item of business had to be determining his opponent’s location in the labyrinth of pallets and missiles. He figured the best way to do that would be to fire a shot or two down every other column of pallets, in the hopes that he could bait his opponent into returning fire, thus revealing their position. Yes, this would give away his position too, but he figured the tradeoff would be worth it.

The red fox moved quickly to execute his plan, kneeling down beside the corner pallet closest to the entrance. He took a breath before turning briefly around the side of the stack of missiles and fired two shots down the first aisle (the aisle between the first and second columns of pallets). The speaker embedded in the side of his training sidearm emitted two loud bangs, simulating the firing of the real weapon, while a speaker on the wall at the other end of the room emitted two pinging sounds, simulating bullets ricocheting off the metal wall. He quickly pulled back behind the cover of the corner pallet and waited for a moment, listening for any return fire, but the only sound that greeted his ears was his rapidly increasing heartbeat.

He sprinted between the pallets that marked the second and third columns of missiles, and once he had taken cover again, fired down the third aisle. But once again, he was met with silence. He repeated this process a couple more times, before finally achieving some success. When he fired down the seventh aisle, he barely had time to whip back behind the cover of the missiles before he heard the speaker mounted a few feet from him on the wall on his end of the room ring out with the sound of “bullets” ricocheting off of it. Okay, he knew his target was down this aisle, but now he needed to figure out how far down they were. He scooted over a little bit to peak around the other corner of the pallet he was hiding behind. He didn’t see anyone down the sixth aisle, so he planned to head down this way until he found the enemy.

He took a few breaths to try to slow the flood of adrenaline that was now pumping through his veins before darting from his current hiding place to new cover behind the stack of missiles that marked the intersection of the sixth column and second row of pallets, being greeted with a hail of gunfire as he went. He heard the last couple of “bullets” from this volley strike the metal framework that held up the stack of missiles he was hiding behind.

“*I* have to be careful what *I* shoot at?!” he whispered to himself incredulously. If the “bullets” his opponent had fired had struck a couple of inches in either direction, the missile itself would have received the impact, potentially blowing himself and his opponent to Kingdom Come. Well, they would be simulated to have been blown to Kingdom Come anyway.

He paused a moment before darting behind the stack that made the seventh column and third row, and then moved again to new cover behind the sixth column and fourth row, slowly working his way further into the stacks, being chased by a stream of bullets each time.

“‘Wilde, some things in here don’t react well to bullets,’” he quoted his classmate in a whisper before responding sarcastically to himself, “Yeah, like me. I don’t react well to bullets.”

He poked his head around the corner to try to get a better fix on the enemy’s location. He saw the enemy’s sidearm slide around the corner of the stack making the intersection of the seventh column and the sixth row before immediately whipping back around behind the cover as a few more “bullets” flew past his head. He had them now.

Nick was now close enough to hear his opponent working on the circuitry of the dummy bomb as he devised a plan to move around silently to sneak up behind them from the other side of the room. His tail bristled and twitched angrily in his heightened state of awareness.

When he had calmed down somewhat, he stood and moved as silently as he could down the aisle between the third and fourth rows before turning left and moving between the second and third columns. As he approached the intersection with the sixth row, he stopped and took cover for a moment behind another stack. He listened to make sure the enemy was still occupied with the circuity before sprinting across the intersection while still being light on his feet. Once he crossed, he stopped and listened again. He heard no change in the noise being made by his opponent, indicating that he had not been spotted. Satisfied, he continued down to the eighth row and turned left once more. He stopped upon reaching the seventh column. He composed himself for a moment. This is what it all came down to. In a moment, he would spin around from behind his cover, run up to the enemy, and arrest them in one fell swoop, thus “saving the city” and becoming only the second cadet to pass this exercise on his first try. Well, that was the plan anyway.

And we all know what they say about the best laid plans.

Nick whirled around from his cover and ran up to his opponent, weapon drawn and screaming at the top of his lungs, “FREEZE! ZPD! GET ON THE GROUND NOW!”

His opponent, who had their back to him and was kneeling in front of the open panel of the bottom-most missile in the stack, jumped to their feet and whirled around to face him in shock, still holding two wires, one in each hand, with the insulation stripped away from the first inch at the end of each, exposing the bare metal contacts underneath. The wires ran back into the access panel of the missile.

Then he saw it.

The gray fur. The long ears. Those amethyst eyes that he knew so well. His jaw, and his sidearm, dropped.

“Carrots?” he asked slowly. They both stood there for a moment, staring at each other, still in shock. While the rabbit couldn’t believe that Nick had actually managed to get this close to completing the exercise, especially considering her exceptional hearing, Nick was in utter amazement that he had been competing against the best officer on the force, Officer Judith Laverne Hopps, this whole time.

Unfortunately for Nick, Judy managed to recover from her shock first, and a grin slowly spread its way along her face.

“You lose,” she said simply, and before Nick knew what was happening, the bunny cop touched the metal contacts of the two wires together, and an alarm blared throughout the whole building, bringing Nick back to his senses.

“THERMONUCLEAR WEAPON DETONATION! YOU’RE DEAD, FOXTROT!” Dawson’s voice boomed through a loudspeaker in the ceiling. “Now get out of my building! Everybody out here is waiting on you!”

Nick scowled at the speaker before turning his attention back to Judy. “How are you…?” He began before pausing. “I-I mean, why are you…?”

Judy giggled at his confusion. “It’s called a hustle, sweetheart,” she replied with a grin as she dropped the wires and grabbed his paw. “Now come along, you’ve got the rest of the day off, and we’re going to make the most of it. You need to hit the range, your marksmanship needs serious work!”

“But, don’t you have to stay and play the enemy combatant for everyone else?” Nick asked, able to form a coherent sentence once again.

“Nope,” she replied. “They called me in special just for you. The identity of your opponent is what makes it such a psychological test. Now come on, last one to the range has to clean the pistols afterwards!” she called as she took off running out the door in the opposite corner of the building from which he had entered.

Nick chuckled. “Sly bunny,” he muttered with a grin as he took off after her.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! I must stress that I have no idea if the Air Force actually works with local police departments regarding nuclear weapons security (though I seriously doubt they do, considering the highly classified nature of these weapons), nor do I know anything about how and where nuclear weapons are stored, so those elements of the story are total guesswork on my part. The information about the Air Launched Cruise Missile came straight from Wikipedia.

I hope I got Nick’s character right. I’m not much of a comedian, so his wisecracks were hard to write for. If y’all have any tips on writing for his character, I would greatly appreciate them.

I’m hoping to get the next installment written and posted in about the same amount of time it took me to do this one, but I’m not making any promises. So until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	3. The Great American Race

The Great American Race

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! Thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so.

This third installment is going to examine an obsession of Judy’s from a humorous point of view (or at least that’s the intent). Based on the title and the fact that she’s a country bunny, y’all can probably guess what I’m talking about.

This story takes place after the movie, about a month after Nick’s graduation from the Academy.

Zootopia, NASCAR, Fox Sports Go, Martinsville Speedway, Watkins Glen International, Talladega Superspeedway, the Daytona 500, Daytona International Speedway, Ferrari, Formula One, Ford Motor Company, Team Penske, Hendrick Motorsports, and Chevrolet belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

#

For the most part, it was a typical day of office work for Officer Judy Hopps and newly minted Officer Nick Wilde. The two of them sat at their desks in their small, square, shared office at Precinct 1, dressed in their Class Cs, their backs to each other, slaving away at their desktop computers on paperwork from recent cases. The tap-tap-tap of paws hitting computer keys filled the room and floated out the open door to Judy’s left and out the open window to Nick’s left. Yes, for the most part, it was just a typical day at the office.

But there were a few items of note that made this day unique. For one, it was a Sunday. Judy and Nick normally worked an 8:30 to 5 shift on Monday through Friday, but the way the ZPD schedule worked, every officer had to work one Saturday or Sunday every couple of months, so that no one would have to work weekends on a regular basis. As a result, there were fewer officers in the building than there normally would be. In fact, Nick and Judy’s office was the only office on their hallway that wasn’t empty today. And it was a good thing too, because of the other unique element about today. If anybody else on their hallway had been at work today, the predominant sound they would have heard coming from the rookies’ office would not have been the usual paws on keyboards, but rather the angry roar of 40 stock cars racing at nearly 200 miles per hour.

You see, when Judy and Nick had been given their work schedule for this two week stretch, Judy had been absolutely livid to see that they had been assigned to work this Sunday of all Sundays. She was upset not only that she would have to miss church, but also because she would have to miss the race. Yes, Judy Hopps was a MASCAR [in case you don’t remember from the first installment: Mammalian Association for Stock Car Auto Racing] addict. It was an obsession she had picked up from her parents and older brother during her childhood, and her passion for the sport had only grown as she got older. She loved watching the racing at all the different types of tracks, from the half-mile short track at Martensville, to the high speed esses of the road course at Clawkins Glen, to the high banked turns of the superspeedway at Talondega.

Now, if she had been scheduled to work on any other Sunday and miss a race at any of these other tracks, she would have been disappointed for sure, but would have gotten over it quickly. After all, she had duties to perform and it wouldn’t have been THAT big a deal to miss ONE race out of the long 36 race season. However, today was different. Today was the biggest and most prestigious race of the year. Today was the 59th running of the Preytona 500.

It was all Judy had talked about in the week leading up to their weekend workday, and through most of the week, Nick had just nodded or agreed politely, trying to be a good friend even though he didn’t really understand the appeal of watching cars go around in a circle. He had hoped that this would all blow over on its own, but when Friday afternoon rolled around and she was still complaining, he decided that he needed to say something, if for no other reason than for his own sanity. They had been in the patrol car on their way back to the precinct when Nick finally spoke up.

#

“I mean, the chief is being so unfair,” the rabbit officer complained. “I specifically requested NOT to be scheduled on that day and-”

“Carrots!” Nick cut her off.

Judy turned to face him briefly before turning her eyes back to the road ahead, surprised by his outburst. “Yes, Nick?”

Nick removed his mirrored aviators from his snout and took a breath to calm himself down before speaking. “You’ve been complaining about this all week. That’s not like you. You’re normally a doer, not a whiner. So why don’t you stop whining and do something about it?”

“I’m not whining!” she protested as they slowed to a stop at a red light.

Nick just tilted his head and stared at her.

“Okay, so I’m whining,” she admitted. “But what do you suggest I do about it, bright boy?”

“Watch the race,” the red fox simply replied.

“What?” she asked confused. “Nick, pay attention. I’ve just spent the whole week telling you why I CAN’T watch the race and now you’re telling me-”

“Look, you’ve got cable, right?” Nick cut her off again.

“Well, yes, but-”

“And the race is being broadcast on Fox, right?”

“Right.”

“So just bring in your laptop and watch the race on Fox Sports Go,” Nick was referring to the service that allowed mammals with cable or satellite to watch sporting events on their computers or mobile devices when they were aired on the Fox family of networks. “I mean, you know we’re just going to be stuck at our desks all day on standby in case someone on patrol needs backup, and I’m sure you’ve got most, if not all, of your paperwork done for the week, so just watch it at your desk.”

Judy looked at the red fox for a moment before a huge grin spread across her face and she leapt towards Nick as far as her seat belt and the center console would allow her, wrapping her partner in a hug. “Oh, Nick! You’re a genius!”

Nick was surprised by the hug, but he certainly wasn’t complaining. In fact, it felt… really good. He shook off the thought before replying with one of his signature wisecracks. “I know,” he said with a smile. “Sly fox, dumb bunny. Remember?”

“I’m NOT a dumb bunny,” she retorted with a playful scowl.

“Right. And that traffic light’s not green,” he grinned as he looked out the windshield.

She followed his gaze to see that the light had indeed turned green. She harrumphed as she returned to her seat and the car behind them honked at them.

“Dumb fox,” she muttered just loud enough for him to hear as they began to roll through the intersection, a hint of a grin on her face.

“You know you love me.”

“Yeah, yeah, yeah.”

#

“Hello everyone, and welcome back to Preytona International Speedway in sunny Preytona Beach, Florida and our MASCAR on Fox coverage of the 59th running of The Great American Race. I’m Mike Joey [a kangaroo] alongside my broadcast partners Darrell Wooltrip [a sheep] and Jeff Gore-don [a bull]. Our first caution of the day came just a few laps ago for Kyle Boarsch’s spin while exiting Turn Two, but the MASCAR cleanup crews have cleared the debris, the cars are lined up two by two as they come out of Turn Four, the pace car is ducking off onto pit road, and we are ready for the restart. Joey Liongano and Denny Hamlynx accelerate through the restart zone as they lead the field back to the start-finish line! The green flag is out and we are back to racing as we complete lap 65 of 200 at Preytona!”

Back in Nick and Judy’s office, the bunny cop, who was wearing a (most definitely not within regulations) black baseball cap with the famous Fang Motor Company blue oval logo stitched across the front and the word “Racing” stitched underneath, was practically screaming at her laptop screen. “Come on, Joey, go! Don’t let him side draft off you! That’s it! That’s it! No, no! Get in front of him! Come on, that’s it! You’re clear! Come on up and block him!”

Nick sighed. Now he wished he had kept his big mouth shut and endured the complaining just a little longer. He had been around obsessed race fans before (Mr. Big, for instance, was a huge fan of the Furrari Furmula 1 team), but Judy took the carrot cake. She had finished the last of her paperwork that morning and her eyes and ears were now glued to her laptop. The volume was cranked way up and Nick struggled to focus on the mountain of paperwork he still had to finish so it could be on the chief’s desk in the morning.

‘Okay, let’s see…’ he thought to himself as he typed up their weekly after action report. ‘This week we pulled over 14 cars, 11 of them for speeding, and the #19 car was busted for speeding exiting pit road during that last caution… Wait, what?’ Nick stopped as he realized what he had just typed. The fox turned his head to look at Judy’s laptop and realized that the network’s rules and technical analyst, Larry McRhinolds was describing penalties handed out on the last round of pit stops. Nick shook his head in an attempt to focus as he turned back to his work.

“Thanks for that update Larry Mac,” the kangaroo commentator thanked his colleague before addressing the viewing audience. “Well folks, did you get a new surround sound for Christmas? Can you get to that volume knob in a hurry? How about a Fox MASCAR Crank it Up!”

The commentators fell silent for a couple of laps as the network turned up the volume on the mikes for the in-car and trackside cameras, allowing the viewing audience to fully appreciate just how loud 40 stock cars at full throttle really were.

Nick groaned before turning his head to face Judy again. She was grinning ear to ear as she stared at the monitor. It made him feel good to see her so happy, and a small smile crossed his face briefly, but he had to say something. If he didn’t, then he was never going to get his work done on time, and the last thing he needed was to give Bogo another valid reason to be pissed off at him. “Hey, Fluff?”

“Yes, Nicky?” the race fan replied, not losing her grin nor turning her gaze from the monitor.

“Do you have some earbuds or something you could plug in? I don’t mean to put a damper on your enjoyment of the oh so thrilling spectacle of watching cars go around in a circle, but the Chief needs this AAR [after action report] on his desk in the morning and…”

When she realized what he was implying, she turned to face him and the grin fell from her face. “Oh, Nick, I’m so sorry! I don’t know what I was thinking! Yeah, I have some earbuds around here somewhere.” She began opening drawers in her desk looking for the earbuds in question when she suddenly stopped, realizing something. “Wait a minute, how selfish am I?! Here I am enjoying myself while you’re slaving over our paperwork! Here, let me help you.” She began firing up her desktop computer.

Nick smiled at how dramatic she was being. To be perfectly honest, it was kind of cute. “No, no, no. I told you I would take care of this, and I’m a fox of my word. You just plug in your earbuds and enjoy your race.”

“But I’m your partner, Nick. I shouldn’t be slacking off while you’re working.”

“I’m also your friend,” Nick replied. “And friends do things for one another.”

“But-”

“Besides, if you missed this race, then that would mean I would have endured all your whining this week for nothing, and that would make me really pissed. You don’t want that do you?”

Judy smiled slightly before sighing. “Are you sure?”

“Absolutely. 100%”

“Okay.” She dug her earbuds out of the last drawer she had opened, stuck them in her ears, and plugged them into the laptop. The roar of race cars instantly ceased as the only sound in the room now was the low hum of the running computers.

Nick turned back to his computer with a satisfied smile on his face. ‘Okay, back to work. Let’s see. Fourteen cars pulled over…”

#

A few hours later, as Nick sat back in his seat and waited for the printer on his desk to finish printing the 106 pages of paperwork he had just finished (a lot longer than normal to be sure, but this had been an abnormally busy week; he wished now he hadn’t volunteered to do it all himself), the race had just entered its final lap and Judy was oblivious to everything except what she saw on her screen and what she heard through her earbuds.

“The white flag is out at Preytona!” Mike Joey exclaimed. “One more time around this two and a half mile tri-oval superspeedway! Brad Koalaski leads the inside line of cars! Joey Liongano leads the outside line! They’re neck and neck as they go into Turn 1!”

“And Dale Elkhardt Jr, who’s running right behind Liongano in that outside line is sliding back a bit!” Darrell Wooltrip added. “He could be easing back to pick up the #11 of Hamlynx to try and get a run on Liongano when they exit the final turn!

“We shouldn’t be surprised a bit to see it come down to a battle between Elkhardt, Koalaski, and Liongano,” Jeff Gore-don interjected. “Team Pawnske and Hayndrick Motorsports have absolutely dominated today, leading a combined 167 laps of this race.”

“Well we’ll see when they decide to make the move,” Mike Joey continued. “You have to figure it’s going to be pretty quick because they’re coming down the backstretch for the final time. And he’s making the move now! Elkhardt got a HUGE run on Liongano down the backstretch! Liongano is doing everything he can to block him!”

“And that got Liongano loose going into Turn 3!” Gore-don yelled. “Elkhardt Jr. just tapped him in the left rear! He’s sliding up the track!”

Judy stopped breathing as she watched one of her favorite drivers struggle for control.

“Oh my gosh! Liongano saved it!” Mike Joey screamed into his mike.

“He might have saved it, but he’s up out of the racing groove now and sliding back through the pack! Liongano is not going to win his second Preytona 500,” Wooltrip commented.

“So now Dale Elkhardt Jr. moves up to take the number two spot!” Mike Joey continued. “Can the driver who missed half of last season with a concussion win his third career Preytona 500?! It’s now Brad Koalaski versus Dale Elkhardt Jr. as they enter Turn 4! Fang blue oval versus Chevroneigh bow tie! They’re side by side coming into the tri-oval! IT’S A DRAG RACE TO THE LINE!”

“THEY TOUCH! THEY TOUCH!” Gore-don screamed as the two leaders banged doors.

“AND IT’S TOO CLOSE TO CALL AT THE LINE!” Mike Joey exclaimed as the 33 cars still running crossed the start-finish line within three seconds of each other. “We’re looking at the computers for timing and scoring and-”

“BRAD KOALASKI HAS JUST WON THE CLOSEST PREYTONA 500 EVER!” Gore-don screamed as the results appeared. “SEVEN ONE THOUSANDTHS OF A SECOND!”

“HAVE YOU EVER?!” Wooltrip asked in amazement.

“NO I NEVER!” Mike Joey responded.

“Wow!” Gore-don exclaimed.

Judy leapt from her chair in excitement and pumped both fists in the air, her earbuds popping out of her ears in the process. “YES!” she cheered at the top of her lungs.

Unfortunately, Nick had chosen that particular moment to bring the now completed paperwork over to Judy to have her sign it. He had been standing right next to her chair when the race winner was announced, and Judy, unaware of anything other than the race, punched the bottom of the huge stack he had been holding with her left fist as she began her celebration. One hundred and six pieces of paper went flying as Nick landed on his rear end, shocked by the sudden outburst from the bunny.

Judy, meanwhile, was still oblivious to everything other than the fact that one of her favorite drivers had just won the most prestigious race of the year. She was bouncing all over the office, unable to contain her excitement. “YES! YES! OH, YES! SUCK IT, JUNIOR! WHOOOOOOO!”

The bunny didn’t return to reality until she slipped on one of the pieces of paper that had landed on the floor, causing her to tumble forward and land on Nick’s stomach, perpendicular to him, with her head and upper body on one side of his torso, her legs and feet on the other.

By now, Nick had recovered from his initial shock and was now slightly aggravated. “Carrots! Look what you did! It’s going to take forever to get all of these back in the right order!”

Judy looked around the room at the mess she had caused. “Oh, sheez. I’m so sorry, Nicky! I just got really wrapped up in the race and it was such a close finish and Brad won and I just-” She sighed. “I’m sorry. Let me help you clean this up.” She moved to begin picking up the papers.

Nick sighed and laid his head back against the floor, staring up at the ceiling. He let out a chuckle.

Judy turned to face him and saw the smile on his face. “What’s so funny?” she asked, a smile starting to appear on her own face.

“I swear,” he chuckled again and shook his head. “You country girls and your stock car racing. You’re going to be the death of me.”

Judy grinned. “Oh, please. You know you love me.”

“Do I know that?” he asked, turning his head to look at her before staring back at the ceiling. “Yeah… Yeah, I do.”

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! It just made sense to me that Judy, being from the country, would be a fan of stock car racing, and I’ve wanted to incorporate racing into one of my stories for some time now, so I was really excited when the inspiration for this came to me.

Some of you are probably wondering what’s happened to Captain Hopps. Well, don’t worry, I haven’t forgotten about him. He’ll appear again soon, all in good timing.

I’m would like to think that I could get the next installment written and posted in about the same amount of time it took me to do this one, but I think the story is going to be significantly longer than these first three installments, so I’ll considered myself blessed if I can get it posted in the next two weeks. We’ll see how it goes. So until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	4. Mistaken Identities and Fitness Tests

Mistaken Identities and Fitness Tests

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! I’m back from the dead! But seriously, I know it’s been a few months since I updated, but things have been pretty busy for me recently. I went on active duty with the Air Force sooner than I thought and I start pilot training in a few weeks, so I’ve basically been writing this whole thing a few lines each day, and that’s probably how it’s going to be from here on out, so there will be lengthy stretches in between updates and I’m not committing to update deadlines. Just know that the story isn’t dead or on hiatus, it’s just being worked on reeeaaalllyyy slowly. That’s just the way it is. On the plus side, I’ve got a long one for you here, over 18,000 words! So thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this and waited patiently on me. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

Another minor piece of head cannon that I think is obvious, but I still want to make explicit: the words “man,” “mankind,” and “people” can or are used to refer to sentient mammals in this world.

A couple of reviewers have pointed out a plot hole in the second story that I feel I must address. In the Academy nuclear weapon exercise, the bad guy is attempting to detonate the warhead by accessing the circuitry, when it is implied several times that all they would have to do is shoot it to make it go off. In reality, nuclear weapons are intentionally designed to be virtually impossible to detonate except through a very specific set of circumstances. In fact, there was one time during the Cold War when a B-52 collided in mid-air with a refueling tanker, causing the bomber’s nuclear payload to be separated from the wreckage, but the bombs did not detonate when they hit the ground, because the aircrew (obviously) did not set the chain of events in motion that would be required to detonate the warheads. My inspiration for this story was the scene towards the end of the film The Hunt for Red October where the protagonist gets into a firefight with a saboteur who is attempting to detonate one of the missiles aboard a Soviet ballistic missile submarine. The saboteur is attempting to detonate the warhead via the circuitry instead of just shooting it, even though the captain of the sub reminds the protagonist that “Most things in here don’t react too well to bullets.” I just really like that line, and a couple of related lines that I borrowed from the movie, so that is why I knowingly wrote the story with the same plot hole from the movie. I know it’s not very realistic, but, well… I don’t really care.

This story takes place almost three months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy.

Zootopia, Ford Motor Company, Assemblies of God, NASCAR, Dunkin’ Donuts, Honda, Moana, the Kansas City Royals, Subway, Strategic Air Command, Those Magnificent Men in Their Flying Machines, American Graffiti, and Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Okay, enough rambling! Without further ado, here is the fourth installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: Mistaken Identities and Fitness Tests!

#

It was a cool, early spring Sunday in Zootopia. The sun was shining and there wasn’t a cloud in the sky. It was sometime between noon and one as Nick drove his ’03 Fang Mustang through the streets of Savannah Central, finishing up some errands before driving back to his house. He was planning on calling Judy when he got home and asking her if she wanted to come over to his place to hang out that afternoon after her church service ended.

As it so happened, the route back to his house took him past his partner’s church. When he rolled to a stop at the stoplight at the intersection in front of Savannah Central First Assembly of God, he turned to gaze at the brick and mortar sanctuary. Judy had asked him to come with her a couple of times to a Sunday service, but he had always come up with some excuse not to go. He didn’t have a problem with his rabbit friend’s beliefs or anyone else’s for that matter, but he felt that the whole thing just… wasn’t for him. His parents had taken him to church almost every Sunday when he was younger, but when he had hit his teen years and began doing his hustles, he began going less and less often before finally stopping altogether. Maybe someday he would go back and give the whole thing another try, but it would probably take some pretty significant circumstances for that to happen. [I’m going to take the guesswork out of this one for y’all: this is definitely foreshadowing.]

As he pondered these things, he noticed that mammals of all shapes and sizes had begun to walk out the front doors of the sanctuary. The service must have just finished. He strained to see if he could find Judy in the crowd. Finally, after a goat couple stepped through the doors and turned to head for the parking lot, he saw his partner walk out, wearing a white sundress. But what he saw next surprised him. Right behind Judy was another gray furred rabbit, a MALE rabbit, about half a head taller than Judy, wearing a blue suit. He came along side of her and said something to her. She smiled at him before hugging him, taking his paw in hers, and walked with him paw in paw out to the parking lot. They both walked over to a crew cab Fang F-150 Raptor. Nick knew this was not Judy’s car. The male rabbit helped Judy into the passenger side before walking around and getting in the driver side.

HOOOOOONNNNNNNKKKKKKK!!!!!!!!

Nick snapped his gaze from the church parking lot to the traffic light and saw that it had turned green. He gave an apologetic wave to the car behind him and began rolling through the intersection. But as he continued on his way home, he couldn’t help but be puzzled at what he had just seen, and he couldn’t quite shake a twinge of something in his chest that he couldn’t quite identify. Carrots hadn’t gone and found herself a boyfriend… had she? No, of course not. He and Judy were close friends and she would have told him if something so significant had happened to her. That must have just been a friend from church giving her a ride home. Although… their body language did seem to indicate they were closer than friends… Well, he didn’t know what to think. He resolved to shake it off for now and simply ask Judy about it the next time he was with her, hopefully this afternoon. They had always been honest with one another, and there must be a perfectly logical explanation.

#

Nick pulled his car into his driveway and stepped out, grabbing the groceries he had bought before walking up to the front door of 1955 Cypress Grove Lane. He put his key in the lock and opened the door. It was a nice house, just shy of 2,000 square feet; a bit big for someone living by themselves, but he liked his space. However, with the cut in pay he had taken going from conning to an honest job, he was probably going to have to take on a roommate to help with the rent, or just find a smaller place.

He set the bags of groceries on the kitchen counter before walking into the living room and turning on the TV, changing the channel to the MASCAR race. Normally, he would never voluntarily spend his time watching such a thing, but since it was one of Judy’s favorite activities, he figured it might put her in the best possible mood to discuss what he saw in the church parking lot. Besides, the past few times that Judy had come over to his place on a Sunday, they had always ended up watching the race anyway, so he might as well avoid the battle and just go with it.

After putting away the groceries, he glanced at the clock to see it was nearly quarter ‘til two. If he was going to invite her over, he’d better get a move on. He grabbed his cell phone off the counter and dialed her number. After a few rings, he got her voicemail.

“Hi, it’s Judy Hopps! Leave me a message! Bye!” BEEP.

“Hey Fluff, it’s your favorite fox in the whole wide world. It’s quarter ‘til two and I was just wondering if you’d like to come over and hang out at my place this afternoon. I’ve got the race on the TV and I’m about to pop some popcorn. Give me a call when you get this. See ya soon. Bye.”

#

BEEP. “Hey Carrots, it’s me again. It’s 3:30; just wondering if you got my message and what your plans are. You’re missing a really good race by the way. At least I think it’s a good race. I need an expert to help me know for sure. Anyway, let me know what’s going on. See you soon.”

#

BEEP. “Okay Judy, what’s going on? It’s quarter to five and I haven’t heard anything from you. Can you please just give me a call, text, something? I don’t like being left in the dark. Help a fox out.”

#

BEEP. “Please Judy, you’re starting to scare me. It’s almost six and I still haven’t heard from you. Please just let me know you’re still alive. I’m really getting worried. Call, text, send smoke signals, I don’t care, just please let me know what’s going on.”

Nick ended the call and tossed the phone down on the couch next to him with a sigh. He stared at the now blank TV screen (the race had ended a half hour ago) and wondered what to do now. It wasn’t like Judy to ignore his calls like this. In fact, whether he called or texted her, he couldn’t think of a time when she hadn’t returned the call or text within the hour. There was really only one logical reason he could think of why she wouldn’t return his calls and it terrified him. Had that bunny she had got in the truck with done something to her? He quickly shook the thought off. He was probably overreacting. She was a strong bunny, she could take care of herself. But, maybe he should go over to her apartment and check up on her… No, that WOULD be an overreaction - wouldn’t it?

He only had to think for another moment. He leapt from the couch and moved quickly into the entryway to grab his coat out of the front closet. He was about to walk out the front door when he realized he had left his phone on the couch. He sighed in aggravation before he turned around and walked back into the living room and over to the couch. But just as he was about to pick it up, it began to ring.

He picked it up and waited a moment for the caller ID image to pop up. When it did, he breathed a sigh of relief, quickly hit the answer button, and sat down on the edge of the couch. “Judy, thank God! Where in the world are you? Are you alright?”

He heard Judy giggle over the phone. “Yes Nick, I’m fine! You foxes, you’re so dramatic. Take a deep breath and calm down.”

He was a little upset that she was being so cavalier about his concern, but he did as she said before continuing. “Okay Carrots, I’m calm. I’m glad you’re okay. Now where have you been all afternoon? You scared the living daylights out of me. I tried calling you four times.”

“I know. I’m sorry,” she replied in a sorrowful voice. “I would have returned your calls if I could, but I forgot my phone at my place when I left for church this morning and I was out doing stuff all afternoon. I didn’t get back to the apartment until a few minutes ago. I’m really sorry. I didn’t mean to make you worry.”

Nick’s tail bristled a little at this revelation. She was doing stuff all afternoon? He thought back to the male rabbit and the truck. There was that odd twinge in his chest again. “Okay, well, do you want to come over now? I could make us dinner and we could put on a movie or something.”

“Thanks for the offer,” she began before he heard her yawn, “but I’m really tired. I’ve had a long day and I think I might turn in early. But I’ll see you bright and early tomorrow morning when I pick you up for work!”

“I understand,” he forced a smile. “I’ll see you tomorrow morning then; bright eyed and bushy tailed.”

She giggled. “Sounds like a plan! Goodnight Nicky.”

“Good night.” He hung up the phone and leaned back against the back of the couch so that he was slouching. His mind raced as he reviewed the facts of the “case.” Judy had hugged, held hands with, and gotten in a truck with a male rabbit that he didn’t know. She had just told him she had been out doing stuff all afternoon. Those were the facts, but it was little to go on. She had NOT said that she had been doing stuff with the rabbit, so he had to give her the benefit of the doubt. But what else made sense? The only thing that was keeping him from completely jumping to that conclusion was his conviction that she would have told him if it was the case. She WOULD tell him if she had gotten a boyfriend, right? Man, this was all so confusing.

He sighed and got up from the couch, heading upstairs to his bedroom. Maybe he would follow Judy’s example and turn in early. Perhaps he would be able to think more clearly about the whole situation if he got a good night’s sleep.

#

“I’d like mornings better if they started later,” Nick muttered to himself as he wiped the last of the sleep from his eyes and stepped out the front door of his house and into the pre-dawn chill. He walked across his front lawn to the curb, where Judy was waiting for him in her truck. She had just bought the 2000 Fang Ranger a few months ago, and she had gotten a great deal on it considering what the folks at the used car lot originally priced it at. She probably would have been stuck with that price if Nick hadn’t been with her that day to help with his negotiating skills. Being an ex-con artist had its perks. He opened the unlocked passenger door and climbed in.

“Morn-” he was about to greet her when he cut himself off at the sight of the cell phone pressed against her ear.

“Thanks again for yesterday, I enjoyed it,” she said into the phone. “You fly safe now, okay?” A pause. “Yep, see you soon.” Another pause. “I love you too, Pete. Bye!” she ended the call and tossed the phone into one of the twin cup holders that was mounted on the hump in the floor for the drive shaft between the seats. She turned to the red fox in the passenger seat. “Morning!” she greeted with a smile. “Ready to make the world a better place?” she asked as she flicked on the radio and flipped through the frequencies before she settled on a country station that was currently playing The World by Brad Pawsley.

Nick barely heard her greeting and question as he stared at the phone in the cup holder, trying to process what he had just heard. No way. No freaking way. Judy Hopps had a boyfriend. Well, now that she knew that he knew, she would tell him about him soon. Right? And darn that stupid twinge in his chest!

“Nick, you there?” Nick was brought back to reality by his partner snapping her fingers in his face. He shook his head quickly.

“Yeah, sorry Carrots. Guess I’ve just got a case of the early morning stares,” he replied with a fake smile.

“Well, I think I know the cure for that,” she said as the smile returned to her face and she put the truck in gear. “We’ll swing by Trunkin’ Donuts and get some coffee on the way in.”

#

Nick drummed his fingers idly on the steering wheel as he and Judy sat on the side of the road in their patrol car, watching the radar gun for any sign of speeders. It was now late morning and their interactions thus far had been pleasant enough, but they hadn’t discussed Judy’s new relationship at all, and Nick was puzzled that she hadn’t brought it up by now. Perhaps she was just shy about it and needed some coaxing to get it out of her.

“So…” he began, still a little unsure of exactly what to say as he began to speak. “How was your weekend?” That should work. Not too pushy, but it gave her an opening.

“Oh, pretty good,” she replied as they watched a blue Howlnda Civic drive by at just under the speed limit. “Got a head start on our quarterly performance report. Nothing too serious, just put some numbers in.”

He chuckled. “Oh my word, Carrots. Do you EVER stop working?” he asked with a smile.

“Hey! I take time to relax!” she defended herself with a smile on her face. “I also caught up with family, watched the race, and went to church. I didn’t spend the WHOLE weekend working.”

“Oh, you didn’t spend the WHOLE weekend working. WHAT an ACCOMPLISHMENT,” the fox officer grinned back, his voice dripping with sarcasm.

“Hmph!” she snorted, the smile still on her face. They were interrupted as the roar of jet engines entered their ears. Judy looked up to see a B-52 flying low overhead. They were on the south end of town, not too far from Foxchild, so she guessed that the jet was probably on approach to land, since it was heading in the general direction of the base and had its landing gear extended.

Nick noticed that Judy still hadn’t said anything about her date yesterday. So as the jet faded from view, he tried a slightly more direct approach. “But seriously, Fluff,” he began, clearly NOT serious as the smile returned to his face. “You need to stop working so much, or your boyfriend’s not going to hang around long.”

Judy turned to face him for a moment, a confused look on her face. Then she burst into laughter. Not her usual giggle, but a full-blown belly laugh. This confused Nick. He could handle confused, but what she said when she finally calmed down stunned him. “Oh Nicky! You’re a riot! If there’s one thing I definitely don’t have time for right now, it’s a boyfriend!”

Nick couldn’t believe it. She lied to him. She had just outright lied to him. He turned away from her and stared out the windshield.

Judy noticed that he hadn’t laughed with her and was now turned away from her with a stone cold expression on his face. “Hey, are you okay?” she asked gently.

“I’m fine,” he muttered quietly.

“Are you sure? You don’t-”

“I said I’m fine!” he snapped.

She looked him over for another moment before deciding to give him a little time before pursuing the matter further. She knew he was used to solving problems on his own, so she knew when to give him space. Still, his comment and then his reaction had really confused her, so she made a mental note to not let it slide.

#

If you asked any one of the officers who watched the two rookie cops walk through the lobby of Precinct 1 at the end of the day, they would tell you that something had changed between the two since that morning, and not for the better. They walked in silence. The fox stared straight ahead with a stone cold expression on his face as they walked toward the front doors. The bunny had a concerned look on her face as she kept glancing up at her partner.

Judy was now deeply concerned about Nick. Ever since his outburst in the patrol car that morning, he had been noticeably cold toward her, not engaging in casual conversation and only giving short, clipped answers to her questions. It was starting to scare her. She had almost lost Nick once, and she didn’t think she could handle that again. She needed to figure out what was going on. Maybe she could invite him over tonight and they could watch a movie or something. Maybe that would relax him and she could ask what was bothering him.

“I was thinking,” she began as they neared her truck in the parking lot and she hit the unlock button on her key fob. “Would you like to grab something at Bug-Burga and then we could go watch a movie at my place? I just got Meowana on Blu-Ray.” She knew Nick had an affinity for all things Hawaiian, and he had absolutely adored the movie when they went to see it with a few of their co-workers a couple months ago.

“No, thanks,” he replied quickly and curtly as they got into the truck and closed the doors.

“Aw, c’mon! Ple-” Judy began, batting her eyelashes before he quickly cut her off.

“I said, ‘No, thanks,’ Judy. Just take me home. Please,” he said firmly as he closed his eyes and pinched the bridge of his nose.

The first name. That was not a good sign. What in the world was going on? She sighed as she cranked the engine and backed out of the parking space.

#

The low hum of running computers and the sound of paws striking keys were the only two things to break the silence in Nick and Judy’s office the next morning. Nick’s strange behavior had not changed from the day prior. In fact, up to this point, the only word he had said all day since getting in her truck that morning was a brief “’morning” in reply to her greeting as he had climbed into the cab. Other than that, the fox had been as silent as a monk. Judy paused in her work for a moment to look behind her at the fox cop. She was usually pretty good at reading him, but for whatever reason, she was having problems figuring out what was bothering him. And that really irritated her.

Her thoughts were interrupted as they heard someone knock on their open doorframe. The fox and bunny turned to see Clawhauser standing at their door. “Hey Nick,” the cheetah began, “Just wanted to remind you the deadline to take your fitness test is in three weeks. I was looking at the calendar and noticed you hadn’t scheduled it yet.”

Nick groaned. This had totally slipped his mind. All ZPD officers were required to take a fitness test once a year, consisting of a mile and a half run (God only knows how Clawhauser managed to pass every year). Usually, cadets at the academy would take this test shortly before graduation, and thus not have to take it again until almost a year on the force. However, because Nick had injured his knee during one of the exercises in his fifth month at the six month long academy and gone on medical profile, he had been unable to take the test near graduation. For a case such as his, the regs required the new officer take the test within 90 days of joining the force. And for Nick, that 90th day was coming fast. “Okay,” he sighed. “Let’s do the 20th at 0630.”

“You got it,” Clawhauser smiled before heading back to his desk.

Nick sighed again as he leaned his elbow against the armrest of his desk chair and pinched the bridge of his nose. The 20th was in a couple of weeks, and he hadn’t worked out at all since his injury at the academy. This should be fun.

Judy momentarily forgot about the fox’s recent aloofness as she noticed his reaction to Ben’s reminder. “Are you okay?” she asked hesitantly. “Are you worried about the fitness test?”

Nick quickly moved both paws back to the keyboard and returned to work as he snapped, “Don’t worry your pretty little head about it. You’ve got enough on your plate as it is.”

She was really starting to get sick and tired of this. “And just what is that supposed to mean?!”

“You’re smart. You figure it out,” he muttered.

She sighed before turning back to her computer. “I’m just trying to help,” she said quietly.

“Well don’t.”

The rabbit looked back at her partner briefly before turning back forward. While she didn’t know what was bothering her friend so much, she knew that she would need some help herself if she was going to help him. So, she folded her paws and closed her eyes. ‘God,’ she began to pray silently, ‘I don’t know what’s making Nick so upset, but you know. Please help him God, and help me to help him. Show us both what to do. Amen.’ She opened her eyes and returned to work.

#

When Judy got back to her apartment that night, she quickly changed into her PTUs and headed back down to her truck for the quick drive over to the Zootopia Police Academy, where she often used the running track for her workouts. She was hoping that the workout would provide her an escape from Nick’s recent moodiness and maybe give her a little bit of clarity regarding it. But on the drive over, it was the only thing she could think about. Not even the TobyYak and Leclaw songs that the local Christian radio station was blasting through her speakers could drown out her thoughts. What in the world could be bothering him? Was it the fitness test? He did seem upset when Ben reminded him about it, but he had already been acting weird before then. She sighed as she pulled into the parking lot next to the running track on the academy’s campus. She needed to just forget about the whole thing for a while.

The parking lot was almost completely empty at this time of day. In fact, there was only one other car in the lot, but it was a car Judy recognized: an ’03 Fang Mustang. “Is that really his car?” Judy muttered to herself as she stepped out of her truck and grabbed her gym bag. She looked down upon the track from the edge of the parking lot at the top of the steep hill that ran the length of the front straightaway and sure enough, there was her red fox partner dressed in his PTUs, standing at the end of the frontstretch, right in front of the first turn. Like the parking lot, the track was completely empty save for Nick. To her knowledge, Nick had never worked out at the Academy since graduation, so seeing him here was a little strange. But then again, strange had been par for the course for Nick the past couple of days.

He appeared to be stretching in preparation for a run, so Judy decided to observe for a moment. She set her bag down on the pavement and pulled out a stopwatch before leaning against the left front fender of her truck, waiting for the fox to begin his lap. She didn’t have to wait long, as the fox shook out his legs a few final times, took in a breath, and took off into the turn.

Judy pushed the start button on her stopwatch, curious to find out how prepared Nick really was for this test. For mammals her and Nick’s size, regulations required that officers complete the mile and a half in 12 minutes. On the standard running track like the one at the Academy, that came out to six laps at two minutes per lap, and thus 1 minute for a half lap and 30 seconds for a quarter lap. She watched as her partner came out of the first turn at 29 seconds and begin to lumber down the back straightaway. So far so good. However, about midway down the backstretch, she noticed he began to slow a little bit. One minute and five seconds at the end of the backstretch. Not a big deal, but he needed to pick it up a bit.

But he didn’t. As he came through the far turn, Judy could tell that he was really laboring. By the time he reached the front stretch, a minute and fifty seconds had gone by. The lap was shot.

This was disappointing to Judy, but disappointment was quickly replaced by deep concern and a hint of fear as the fox reached the start/finish line. The months of inactivity caught up to the fox, and he collapsed onto his hands and knees and began dry heaving.

“NICK!” Judy screamed in concern as she dropped her stopwatch, grabbed a sports drink from her bag, and half ran-half slid down the grassy hill toward her partner, not bothering to use the stairs at the far end of the track.

“Nick!” she yelled again as she got to the bottom of the hill. “Nick! Are you alright? Here, try to stand up.” She gently grabbed his right arm and helped him to his feet, guiding him over to a trash can that was sitting a few feet away in the infield. They stood in silence for a couple of minutes as he gripped the sides of and leaned over the trash can and she ran a paw up and down his back. When the heaving stopped and his breathing finally slowed, she offered him the sports drink. He let go of the trash can and stood up straight before taking a swig of the drink.

“Thanks,” he muttered flatly.

“What just happened Nick?” the bunny asked quietly.

“I got sick after only running a quarter mile,” the fox replied, again in a very flat tone.

Judy rolled her eyes. “THANK you, Captain Obvious. But why? You didn’t have a very big lunch and if you beat me here from your place then I know you haven’t had anything to eat SINCE lunch.” Nick didn’t respond. But suddenly another thought occurred to Judy. “When was the last time you went running? You HAVE been running since your knee healed up, haven’t you?” Nick didn’t say anything, but the way his ears flattened and he turned his head away from his partner told Judy all she needed to know. “Oh, Nick! How could you blow off something like this?! If you don’t pass this test in two weeks, they’ll kick you off the force!”

The fox whirled back around to face the shorter bunny. “You don’t think I know that?!” he snapped at her, causing her ears to droop behind her head briefly. “You don’t think I’m freaking out inside?! And why should you care? It’s my career, not yours!”

Judy quickly recovered and shot back at him. “How could I not care?! You’re my friend and my partner and I want you to stay on the force!”

Nick scoffed. “Do you now?” he asked in a disbelieving tone.

“Of course I do! And we’ve got to get moving fast if we’re gonna make that happen!” She took a deep breath to calm herself a little before continuing. “I’ve got an idea. My brother – well, one of my brothers - is a B-52 pilot and he just got stationed at Foxchild a couple of weeks ago. He regularly runs the mile and a half in around ten minutes when he takes the Air Force fitness test and he ran the physical training program for his squadron at his last base. Let me call him and see if he would be willing to help train you. If anyone can get you from this,” she gestured up and down at Nick, “to a twelve minute mile and a half in two weeks, it’s him.”

“I don’t need your help,” Nick growled slowly. “I don’t need your brother’s help. Right now, I just need to be left alone. Now if you’ll excuse me,” he said as he turned on his heels and began heading for the stairs, “I think I’ll come back later. The track’s a little too crowded right now.”

“But Nick-”

“I’ll see you at work tomorrow.”

She stared after him for a moment before sighing and heading back up the hill to retrieve her gym bag so she could begin her workout. “God,” she whispered, “I don’t know what to pray at this point. Please, just help me and help him.”

Meanwhile, as Nick trudged up the concrete steps to the parking lot, his mind was going a mile a minute. How could Judy play with his mind like this? How could she act like his friend, act all concerned and caring, and at the same time lie to his face like she did? Especially when she KNEW that he knew about her boyfriend. But at the moment, this was the least of his problems. He was now faced with the task of going from being woefully out of shape to running a mile and a half in twelve minutes in just shy of two weeks. If he couldn’t pull off that miracle, he’d lose his job. Although, as he thought back to his first problem, maybe that wouldn’t be such a bad thing. However, he quickly shook that thought off. “Don’t be stupid, Wilde,” he muttered to himself. “She may have killed your friendship but that’s no reason to throw away a perfectly good career.” Maybe one of the other officers at the precinct would be able to help him out. He decided to ask around at work tomorrow. It was at this moment that he realized he had been so engrossed in this thoughts that he had reached the parking lot, walked up to his car, and then walked right past it for several steps. He sighed as he turned around and walked back the way he came, eager to get home and try to decompress.

#

The next few days were not any better for the bunny and fox. Judy tried (and failed) several times to get Nick to talk about his coldness towards her. And the coldness didn’t let up. In fact, as the days progressed, he seemed to snap at her more and more often. She asked other officers if they could provide any insight into her partner’s actions, but they all said he seemed perfectly normal to them and that maybe it was just her. Nick also failed in his attempts to get some help regarding his fitness from his colleagues. He had asked several officers on their shift, and they had all sympathized with his plight, but they had also all turned him down, offering up similar excuses like they didn’t have the time, or their schedules wouldn’t match up, or they didn’t think they would make for very good instructors. Some had been kind enough to offer a couple of tips, and while he appreciated it, tips simply weren’t going to cut it. All in all, it was a pretty dour week for the two officers, but as Friday rolled around, things came to a head.

The morning briefing had just finished up. It was going to be a slow day, as he and Judy had been assigned to desk duty. Judy hung back in the bullpen to talk with Francine Trunkaby, so Nick left her to it and headed down the hallway to their office. He had spoken with Delgato before the briefing about his fitness test plight, and the emotional heaviness of yet another rejection of help, this time from the lion officer, still weighed particularly heavy on him as he shut the door to the office behind him (a little harder than was necessary) and sunk down into his office chair with a sigh. As he was about to fire up his computer, the sound of a ringing telephone reached his ears. He absentmindedly reached for the handset of the landline phone on his desk, but as he was pulling the handset up to his ear, the ringing continued. It didn’t take him long to realize that the ringing was not coming from the landline on his desk, but from the one on his partner’s. He groaned as he put the handset of his phone back down in its cradle and pushed off from his desk to roll over to his partner’s. He REALLY didn’t want to answer her phone for her, since that would require him to interact with her when he told her about the call, but they were partners and it was almost certainly police business, so he bit the bullet and picked up the handset.

“Hello, Zootopia Police Department. Officer Wilde speaking.”

“Oh, hey!” came a male voice with the slightest hint of a country accent. “So YOU must be the famous Nicholas Wilde! Judy’s told me so much about you. Um, is she there by the way?”

Nick was a little taken aback by the caller’s exuberance and seeming familiarity with himself and Judy, but he ignored it and replied. “Uh, Officer Hopps is out at the moment. And who is this? I can take a message for you, but I’m gonna need your name first.” He reached for the message pad that Judy left on her desk and clicked the button on the side of his mechanical pencil in preparation to write out the message.

“Oh, right, sorry. This is Pete. Can you tell Judy…” Nick zoned out as the caller continued to talk. Normally he would have cut the caller off to ask for a last name, but as soon as he had heard the name “Pete,” he remembered what Judy had said on the phone when he got in her truck Monday morning. ‘I love you too, Pete.’ Crap. Now not only was he answering her phone for her, but to make matters worse, he now had to hold a somewhat normal conversation with her boyfriend. And if he was having trouble being civil with Judy BECAUSE of her boyfriend, he was now really concerned about how difficult it would be to be civil WITH her boyfriend, especially with that twinge returning to his chest. How in the world was he going to survive this? What in the world had he just gotten himself into?

“Hello? Hello?” The sound of Pete’s voice on the phone snapped Nick back to reality.

“Oh, uh, sorry,” Nick replied. “I, uh…, I got a little distracted. Can you repeat that?”

“Uh, sure. Just tell Judy that I made the reservations at Pigerro’s Italian Bistro for 1900 tonight, so I’ll pick her up at 1815.”

Nick was doing everything he could to restrain himself from pressing down too hard with his pencil as he copied the message. “Is that all?” He asked through almost gritted teeth.

“Yep, that should do it! Thanks, Nick! I appreciate it!” Nick clenched his jaw hard. Where did this guy get off calling him by his first name? They had never even met. “I hope we can meet in person soon! Like I said, Judy’s told me so much about you. Hey, I just had an idea! Why don’t you join us for dinner tonight? My treat.”

Nick’s grip on the phone tightened. “Oh, I don’t know that that’s such a good idea, Pete,” Nick said the name in the bitterest voice he could muster. He was TRYING to be civil. He really was. After all, it wasn’t this guy’s fault that Judy had lied to his face about him. But it was REALLY hard. “I wouldn’t want to intrude on your date.”

“Uh, it isn’t a date,” the rabbit on the other end said after a moment. “That would be sort of creepy. Wait a minute, do you know who I am?”

That did it. Nick had been holding his anger in but now this wise guy had given him an excuse to let it out. And he was going to take it. “Listen you little twerp! Don’t you DARE try to tell me that it’s not a date! I’ve already got your girlfriend lying to my face and telling me you don’t exist, I don’t need you doing it too!”

“Wait a minute, Judy’s not my girlfriend! She’s my-”

“Okay, I don’t need to take any more of this!” Nick was now screaming at the top of his lungs. “If you’re just going to follow her lead and lie to me too, then as far as I’m concerned, you two DESERVE each other! I hope you both have a long and happy life together! Or better yet, I hope you both get a taste of your own medicine and stab each other in the back!”

“Hang on, you’ve made a big mistake!”

“Yeah, I picked up the phone.” Nick quipped in a somewhat calmer but no less bitter voice. “But I know how I can fix that!” the fox spat just before slamming the handset back down in its cradle, ending the call.

#

At that moment, in one of the offices of the 55th Bomb Squadron out at Foxchild, a rabbit wearing pilot wings on his flight suit set his cell phone down on his desk. He stared at it for a moment before slowly turning his head to his fellow pilot at the desk next to him. “Hey, Timon?”

“Yeah?” The meerkat asked, not looking up from his computer.

“I just had the WEIRDEST phone call.”

“It sounded like it.”

#

Back in Nick and Judy’s office, the fox cop rested his eyes in the heels of his paws and leaned his elbows against Judy’s desk. “This just isn’t my week,” he muttered as he heard the office door swing open. He looked up to see his rabbit partner standing in the doorway.

“Nick, what in the world was all the yelling about?” Judy asked as she walked in the office and closed the door behind her. “I could hear you halfway down the hallway!”

“Well, I tend to get a little irritable when I have to take phone calls that other people should be able to take themselves,” he spat. “I don’t enjoy being your personal secretary,” he added before pushing off from her desk and rolling back over to his own.

“What the heck is that supposed to mean?” she asked as she walked over to her desk and sat down.

“It means I just had the most enjoyable conversation with your boyfriend!” he replied sarcastically. “The message is there on your desk,” he finished in a much darker tone as he pushed the power button on his computer and leaned back in his chair, waiting for it to boot up.

Judy had noticed the message on her desk and was about to read it, but when her partner said “boyfriend,” she set it back down and turned her chair to face him. “Boyfriend? Nick, I don’t have a boyfriend.”

Nick whirled his chair around to face Judy. The twinge that had not left his chest since Pete had told him his name on the phone swiftly intensified. He had been avoiding talking about this with her because he knew he would lash out at her if he did. But he simply couldn’t contain it anymore. So… he lashed out. “DON’T GIVE ME THAT CRAP, JUDITH LAVERNE HOPPS!” he screamed. “I’m not stupid! I have eyes and ears and I can see what’s going on! I don’t know what made you think it’s okay to lie to me, but it really hurts! A lot! I thought you were my friend!” He figured that was a good stopping point for the moment, as he was now panting heavily.

Judy’s eyes brimmed with tears. He had never yelled at her like this before, not even when she botched her first press conference. “Nick,” she began slowly and quietly. “I-I AM your friend! In fact, I don’t know what I’d do if I lost you again. And I promise you, I don’t have a boyfriend! P-please, we can talk about this like two rational adults. What m-makes you think I’m dating someone?” A tear rolled down her face.

“Really? It’s not cruel enough that you lie to my face, but now you’re going to make me spell it out too? Okay, you know what, fine! At this point, who cares?! If you’re not dating anyone, then please, enlighten me, who was that handsome bunny you were walking out of church with last Sunday?! Who is this ‘Pete’ you were telling ‘I love you’ to on the phone Monday morning when I walked out to the truck?! Please, Judy; tell me who that was if it wasn’t your boyfriend!”

And at that moment, everything clicked for Judy. THIS was what had been bugging her partner all week? She didn’t know if she wanted to laugh at the fox or wring his neck, but she was quickly leaning towards the latter. She quickly wiped away the tears. Her eyes clenched shut and she leaned her head forward, resting her forehead on her two tightly clenched fists. ‘God, please don’t let me strangle him. God, please don’t let me strangle him. God please don’t let me strangle him.’ She repeated the prayer over and over in her head for at least a minute before Nick interrupted her.

“Well?! Are you going to say ANYTHING?!”

“OH, YOU BLOCKHEAD!” she lifted her head, opened her eyes, and roared at him. “YOU IDIOT!”

Nick was a little taken aback by her response but quickly countered. “Oh, I’m a blockhead and an idiot for expecting that my BEST FRIEND would tell me if she had gotten a boyfriend?!”

“YOU DUMB FOX! THAT WAS NO BOYFRIEND! THAT! WAS! MY! BROTHER!”

Nick considered the response for a moment before asking skeptically, “Your brother?”

“Oh, Nick. You dumb, dumb fox,” she shook her head and sighed. “Yes, that was my brother! The one I was telling you about at the track on Tuesday. Here, I’ll prove it to you!” She reached behind her to grab one of the many pictures she had resting in frames on her desk. She found the right one, knocking her Zootopia Royals baseball cap and Brad Koalaski MASCAR die-cast car off the crowded surface and onto the floor in her haste. But at the moment, she didn’t really care. She leapt out of her chair, walked the short distance over to Nick, and shoved the picture in his face. “See?!”

Nick studied the picture for a moment. He thought he knew all of the pictures Judy had on her desk, but this one was unfamiliar to him. Perhaps she had added it recently. It was a picture of Judy in her Class D uniform standing next to a male bunny wearing an Air Force flight suit, a blue flight cap with captain’s bars pinned to it, and a pair of aviators. Not the mirrored silver rimmed aviators that Nick normally wore, but the more classic, gold rimmed, non-mirrored style that had originally been designed specifically for military pilots during the Second World War. He had his arm over her shoulder and they were standing in front of her apartment building. He looked up from the picture to his partner. “Okay, that certainly looks like the guy, but that still doesn’t prove he’s your brother.”

“Read his name tag,” Judy retorted immediately.

Nick looked back down at the picture. On the name tag, embroidered just below the pilot wings, was the name, “Pete Hopps.” Oh crap. Oh crap, crap, crap, crap. Boy, had he just royally screwed up. “Um…. Oops?” he offered with a nervous grin.

“Is this what’s been causing you to act like a Grade A jerk this whole week?” she asked as she lowered the picture to her side and put her other paw on her hip.

“Yes, and I am SO sorry Judy,” the fox began as his face fell and he held his head in his paws. “Oh, I can’t BELIEVE how stupid I’ve been! I should have just asked you about it straight up, but no, I just HAD to try to be sly about it or make assumptions. Oh, I am such an idiot. And then to top it off I accused you of lying and betraying our friendship. You want to talk about betraying friendships? I have been the WORST friend to you this week. I have hurt you so much, I made you cry, and you didn’t deserve any of it!” He sighed and lifted his head to look at her again. “Judy, you said a minute ago that you didn’t know what you would do if you lost me again. Well, I can definitely say the same about you. I think that’s what made me so upset when I thought you were lying to me. I thought we were growing apart, or that you… well, the explanation’s not important. The point is, I don’t want to lose you Judy, so I know I don’t deserve it, but…. Can you find it in your heart to forgive this dumb fox?”

Judy still had a stern look on her face as she folded her arms across her chest. She stared at Nick for what to him felt like an eternity, but in reality was probably only about a minute. Finally, she sighed and a slight smile spread across her face. She extended her arms out in front of her, beckoned with her free paw, and said in an almost whisper “C’mere.”

Nick, slightly encouraged by the smile but still confused about her intentions, got out of his chair and took the two steps forward so he was standing right in front of her. When he did so, she wrapped her arms around his waist and held him in a tight hug.

“Yes, Nick. I forgive you. You can be infuriating sometimes, and you’re certainly a dumb fox, but you’re MY dumb fox,” she said quietly as she turned her head to the side and leaned it against his chest.

Nick smiled and returned the hug. “Thank you, Carrots,” he said softly. “I really am sorry.”

“I know you are,” the bunny cop replied. “But I think I can also understand why you reacted the way you did. You were upset because you cared. And I can appreciate that.” They both stood there holding each other, their eyes closed, thankful that they hadn’t lost their best friend. Suddenly, a thought occurred to Judy. “There’s just one thing I don’t get,” she said as her eyes opened.

“What’s that, Fluff?” Nick asked as they each took a step back and looked at each other, his paws on her shoulders.

“How did you know I went to church with Pete last Sunday?” she asked. When he didn’t answer right away, she continued. “Have you been stalking me, Nick?” she asked with a coy smile. Then she gasped as if she had made a realization. “Are you jealous? Is that what this is really about?” She asked in a joking tone, the smile spreading wider across her face.

Nick knew she was joking, but something inside his mind made him seriously consider what she had just suggested. WAS he jealous? He thought over the events of the past week and the intense emotions he had felt; the pain, the anger, the hurt, and especially that twinge in his chest that had always arisen anytime the thought of her “boyfriend” had come up. That couldn’t be jealousy, could it? They were really good friends and had gotten really close over the last few months, but that didn’t mean he LIKED her, did it? But they did do a lot of the things couples do. They ate the majority of their meals together, they watched a lot of movies together… In fact, most of their waking hours were spent together. Oh crap. Maybe he DID like her. Maybe. Well, he certainly had just been given a lot more to think about, but he definitely couldn’t give the notion any credibility in front of his partner, not at this stage, or it could definitely cause some REAL problems in their friendship. All of this ran through his mind in the second that had passed between her finishing her question and him cracking a sly smile and responding, “You wish, you sly bunny!” He ruffled the fur on the top of her head before continuing, “I just happened to be sitting at the stop light out front when the service let out. Now come on. We probably better get back to work, before someone comes to investigate the racket we just made and finds us goofing off.”

She slapped his paw away from her head with a grin. “Yeah, you’re probably right,” she responded as they both headed back toward their desks and sat down. “And I guess I’d better call my brother too and explain everything,” she said as she picked up the handset of her desk phone and started dialing.

Nick winced as he logged into his computer. He had forgotten about that. “Yeah, I guess I owe him an apology,” he commented before another thought occurred to him. “I know this is a really bad time to ask, but… do you think he’d still be willing to help me with my fitness test?”

Judy turned to look at him briefly as she held the phone to her ear. “I’ll see what I can do. Hey, Pete! It’s Judy.” She turned back toward her desk to continue the conversation.

#

It was late morning the next day, Saturday, when Nick and Judy pulled into the parking lot next to the Academy’s running track. As the two partners, dressed in their PTUs, stepped out of Nick’s car, Nick looked a few parking spaces down the row in the otherwise empty parking lot to see the same bunny he had seen six days ago with his arms folded across his chest and leaning up against the fender of his truck. Peter Hopps was dressed in what Nick assumed were Air Force PTUs: a grey t-shirt with the Air Force symbol in a darker shade of grey on the left chest and “U.S. Air Force” written in the same color underneath it, along with blue running shorts with the same symbol and wording near the bottom of the left leg in a very light grey and a diagonal line across each leg in the same color. “Well, let’s go face the music,” he muttered just loud enough for Judy to hear as he grabbed his bag from the backseat and shut the driver’s door.

“Oh, will you stop worrying Nick,” Judy said as she pulled her bag out and shut the passenger door. “As I’ve told you countless times already, you have nothing to worry about. He completely understood when I explained everything on the phone. You two will get along great, I know it!”

Nick sighed as the two began walking toward the rabbit in question. “From your lips to God’s ears.” She looked up at him with eyebrows raised. He noticed this and said, “It’s just an expression, Carrots, so don’t go reading anything into it.”

She smiled as she turned to face forward again. “Whateeeeever you say, Nicky.”

“So!” Pete exclaimed with a smile as the two partners walked up to him, “This must be the jealous fox I’ve heard so much about!”

Judy’s ears fell back behind her head and she felt her cheeks get a little warm. “Peeeteeer!” the bunny cop exclaimed in embarrassment.

“Relax Jude, I’m kidding,” Peter replied with a warm smile before shifting his weight off the side of the truck and extending a paw for Nick to shake. “Peter Hopps. It’s a pleasure to finally meet you, Nick. I know I’ve said this before, but Judy’s told me a LOT about you, so forgive me if I act like I already know you, because, well, it feels like I do.”

Nick shook the bunny airman’s paw. “The pleasure is all mine, Captain Hopps,” he replied nervously. He was rarely this formal, but this rabbit was not only his best shot at saving his job, but he was also his best friend’s brother, so he was trying to be humble and be on his best behavior. “I um, I also want to apologize for what I said to you on the phone yesterday,” he continued as he stared at the ground and shuffled his feet. “It was incredibly disrespectful and you didn’t deserve it. I’m really sorry.” Nick heard a scoff and looked up, expecting Pete to light into him, but instead, the smile was still there.

“There’s no need to be so formal, Slick,” Pete replied. “Just call me Pete or Pistol. As for our conversation yesterday, don’t give it another thought. Given the information you had, I probably would have done the same thing. You made a mistake. No big deal, we all do it. I forgive you.”

“Thanks,” a small smile appeared on the fox’s face before turning to a look of confusion. “Um, ‘Pistol’?”

“It’s my call sign,” the bunny airman explained. “It’s like a nickname but cooler because pilots use them,” he said only half-jokingly.

“How did you get ‘Pistol’?” Nick asked.

“I’ll explain when the time is right,” Pete replied cryptically. “But enough of the chit-chat, I understand you have a fitness test in ten days.”

“That’s right.”

“Well then we better get started,” he said as he grabbed the bag at his feet and began walking toward the stairs. “When we get down there, go ahead and stretch and I’ll explain the game plan for today.”

“See?” Judy whispered as they followed Pete at a slight distance. “I told you everything would be fine.”

“Almost perfect,” Nick observed. “Is he really that easy going, or are you just really good at convincing people?”

“Oh, I like to think it’s a healthy mix of both,” she replied with a smile, “but it really wasn’t that hard. He’s usually pretty quick to forgive.”

“Well now ‘Pistol’ REALLY doesn’t make sense.”

Her grin became almost sinister. “He’ll explain when the time is right,” she repeated her brother’s words.

“Oh, great,” Nick groaned. “So it’s the whole Hopps family that’s going to be the death of me, not just you.” Judy just laughed.

#

“I don’t know, Jude,” Pete said as he looked down at his stopwatch. “I’m not making any promises. I’m just an American airman, not a miracle worker.” After the three of them had stretched out, (and Pete had shown Nick some dynamic stretches that were better prep for a cardio workout than the static stretches he had been doing) Pete had asked Nick to run one lap, flat out, as fast as he possibly could, just to get a baseline of where the fox was at. Nick had just reached the far turn of this lap, and the time wasn’t looking pretty.

“But Pete,” Judy replied as the two rabbits stood in the infield grass next to the start-finish line, “Wasn’t it General ‘Hop’ Arnold who once said, ‘The difficult we do immediately, the impossible takes a little longer’?”

Pete looked over at his sister’s smiling face. He kept silent for a few seconds before replying, “I hate it when you use airpower history against me.”

Judy’s grin got bigger. “No, you don’t,” she declared firmly.

Pete smiled back. “No. You’re right. I don’t.” Then his smile fell as he looked back down at his stopwatch. “But seriously though, this is going to be pretty near impossible, Jude. I’ve worked with some out of shape airmen in my day, but Nick here might just take the cake. I promise I’ll do everything I can, but you’d better be praying for a miracle, because I sure as heck will be.”

She sighed and looked down at her feet. “Yeah, I know,” she whispered.

“Now having said that,” Pete continued, “You can’t show any indication that you think that way around him, or else this DEFINITELY won’t happen. I’ve found that a lot of what determines the outcome in cases like this is the psychological, not just the physical.”

Judy looked back up at him. “What do you mean?”

“You’re his best friend, Judy. You play a much bigger role in this than you might realize. If he sees you looking defeated about this whole thing, then he’ll get defeated too. He’s going to need your encouragement and support every step of the way with this thing. You spend almost all your waking hours with the guy. You have to put those hours to good use and take every opportunity to motivate him. His career is riding on it.”

Judy looked at her brother for a moment, processing his words. She turned her head to see Nick, who had just come out of the far turn and was coming down the front straightaway. She looked back at her brother for just a second before she cupped her paws around her mouth and yelled at the top of her lungs. “COME ON, NICK! YOU’RE ALMOST THERE! YOU’VE GOT THIS!”

Pete smiled, satisfied that his sister had taken his hint, before he began yelling too. “DON’T SLOW DOWN, NICK! ALL THE WAY THROUGH THE LINE! YOU GOT IT! KEEP PUSHING! KEEP PUSHING! GO! GO! GO!”

They continued to yell words of encouragement to the fox as he approached the start-finish line, crossed it, and then collapsed to his paws and knees, breathing heavily. “That’s it! That’s all I had! Oh my gosh! Oh my gosh, I’m gonna die!” he managed to say between pants.

The two rabbits rushed to help the fox. “C’mon, Slick, you got to get up,” Pete instructed as he slung Nick’s left arm over his shoulder and Judy did the same with his right arm.

“Water. I need water!” Nick panted as the two bunnies lifted him to his feet.

“Then let’s get you some water, big guy,” Judy responded as the siblings started to guide Nick over to the outside of the front straightaway where the three had left their bags.

Actually, it would be more accurate to say that they were CARRYING the significantly taller fox, who was using the height difference to let his feet and lower legs drag along the ground between the two bunnies. “You know,” Pete grunted under the weight, “you actually COULD die if you don’t keep moving. If you stop all activity so suddenly after exerting yourself like that, your heartrate could drop so fast that your heart just stops,” he explained.

Nick groaned in protest, still absolutely exhausted from his sprint, but at least made an effort to plant his feet on the ground and walk the rest of the way. When they reached their bags, Nick removed his arms from the rabbits’ shoulders and began to stoop down to dig his water bottle out of his bag, but Judy stopped him.

“Here, Nick, let me get it for you. You just stand up straight and get as much air in your lungs as you can,” she said as she pulled his bottle from his bag and stood up to hand it to him.

“Thanks Carrots,” the fox panted before he began to chug down water.

“Sip, don’t gulp!” Pete admonished. “If you chug it like that, you’ll throw up. Just take small sips.”

Nick nodded, pulled the bottle away from his mouth for a moment, and leaned on Judy’s head with his arm. Judy rolled her eyes, but allowed him to continue putting some of his weight on her as his breaths started to become calmer. “How’d I do?” the fox asked.

“A minute forty,” Pete responded. “I think I can work with it, I just need to sit down here and refine our game plan for the next week. While I’m doing that, go ahead and take your water and walk a cool down lap.” The bunny airman grabbed a clipboard and some papers out of his bag, sat down in the grass next to the track, and began working.

Nick nodded and took another sip of water before heading back out on track. But after a few steps, he stopped and looked back at the two rabbits. “Walk with me, Carrots?” he asked.

Judy smiled and quickly walked over to him. They walked in silence, for a moment before Nick spoke up. “Judy?”

Uh oh. The first name. “Yes, Nick?”

“I need you to be completely honest with me. Do you really think this can work?”

Judy looked up at Nick, looking confused even though she could probably guess what he meant. “Do I really think what can work, Nick?”

“Training with Peter Cottontail over there for this fitness test. Or training with anyone for that matter,” he said sadly. “I mean, let’s be realistic. I’m woefully out of shape and I’ve only got ten days until the test. I don’t think I have a snowball’s chance in hell of passing. So, again, I need you to be honest with me. Do you think we’re just wasting our time here?”

Judy looked up at her friend in shock. “Nick! You can’t think like that! Of course this can work! Before your knee injury, you got through tougher physical challenges at the Academy than this! I KNOW you can do this!”

“But I had TIME to prepare for those challenges at the Academy! Because of my own stupidity I’ve only got ten days to prepare for this. I’m just…” he sighed. “I’m just really worried Judy.”

There was silence for a few moments as Judy considered the best response. “Do you remember when we first met,” she began, “and I hustled you into helping me solve my first case?” He nodded and she continued. “I had 48 hours to solve that case, a case that nobody had been able to advance in two weeks. It was supposed to be an impossible task, but we did it. WE did it Nick. You were a major part of that. I couldn’t have done it without your help. And that’s just one impossible thing you’ve accomplished. I could go on and on about all the incredible things we’ve done in our short time as partners. And now you’ve got two people helping you, instead of just me. Now I’m not saying this is going to be easy, because it’s not. I can’t guarantee that you are going to pass on the 20th. Nobody knows the future. But I have faith in you, Nick. I believe you have a solid, fighting chance. Pete is one of the best at training people for this one very specific physical activity. In fact, I know you’re not a Christian, but I believe that part of the reason God put Pete at Foxchild at this particular time was to help you. Ever since Ben popped into the office on Tuesday and reminded you about this test, I have been praying constantly for you, and I have faith that God will help you through this.” She paused for a moment before concluding, “I guess what I’m trying to say is… everything is going to be okay, Nick.”

Nick didn’t respond right away, and Judy was worried that she hadn’t gotten through to him, but after a period of silence, Nick spoke up again. “Thanks, Fluff,” he said quietly. “I needed to hear that. And you’re right, I’m not a Christian, but hearing the confidence you have in your faith and knowing that you’re praying for me… It does make me feel a bit better. Thank you.”

She smiled up at him. “Of course,” she whispered.

He looked down at her and returned the smile. “I don’t say this often enough, but I am really, really lucky to have you as my friend and partner,” he said as he wrapped an arm around her shoulder and pulled her against his side.

She giggled. “I would say ‘blessed,’ but either way, you bet your badge you are!”

Nick laughed and waved his arm in dismissal. “Ah! Details!”

Judy laughed along with him, happy that her friend was in a better mood. By this time, the two cops had made it most of the way around the track and were now approaching the start-finish line and Pete, who was standing on the infield grass next to the line. As he heard Nick and Judy’s laughter fade away, he began speaking, still looking down at his clipboard. “Okay, Slick, I think for the rest of today we’ll just jog and focus on your running form. Tomorrow we’ll start working…” He slowly stopped talking as he looked up for the first time and saw Nick’s paw over his sister’s shoulder. His gaze then moved to make eye contact with the fox. “I didn’t think the right time would come so quickly.”

“Huh?” Nick asked as he and Judy came to a stop in front of the pilot.

Pete’s gaze shifted so that he was now staring directly at Nick’s paw. “My call sign is Pistol because I’m the first person in the history of the U.S. Air Force to get a perfect score when I qualified on the pistol,” he explained simply.

Nick’s head turned slowly as he followed Pete’s gaze to where his paw was resting. The fox put two and two together and quickly removed the offending paw, bringing it down to his side. “Oh,” he said quietly as he wore a nervous expression. Nick was quickly learning that despite the fact that Pete was younger and smaller than him, the bunny pilot could be REALLY intimidating when he wanted to be. The three of them stood there in silence, Nick looking down at his feet, Judy looking at her brother expectantly, and Pete still looking at the fox with an unamused expression. However, after a moment, Pete’s lips began to curl up into a smile, as did Judy’s, before the two rabbits began laughing. Nick’s head snapped up, and he looked back and forth between the two rabbits. “Um, did I miss something?” he asked confused.

“Gotcha!” Judy shouted before she continued laughing.

“Relax, Slick,” Pete began to explain as he calmed himself down. “You’re not in any trouble. I just wanted to see if I could hustle the hustler! Knowing how close you and Judy are, I figured a situation would present itself where I could pretend to be the overprotective older brother. You should’ve seen the expression on your face!”

Nick turned to face his partner. “Did you know about this?” he asked.

“We may have discussed it,” she answered with a smile.

“Sorry Slick,” Pete continued with a smile. “Just trying to lighten the mood a little. Now c’mon, it’s almost noon and I want you to get in a solid two miles before we break for the day,” he said as he turned and began jogging into the first turn.

“You heard the man. Let’s go!” Judy exclaimed as she grabbed Nick’s paw and pulled him into a jog next to her.

“You know I’m not just gonna let this go, right?” Nick asked with a smile.

“Oh, I’m quaking in my fur,” Judy replied sarcastically as the two cops caught up to and then matched Pete’s speed.

#

Nine days before the test.

“You’re doing good, Nick,” Pete encouraged as he, Nick, and Judy jogged down the back straightaway. “Remember to control your breathing. Slower, deeper breaths are better than quicker, shallower ones.”

“Trying,” the fox panted in response.

Just nine more days.

#

Eight days before the test.

“Uh, Carrots? Where are you going?” Nick asked the rabbit in the driver’s seat. “Bug-Burga is back that way,” he said as he pointed in the general direction of the patrol car’s rear window.

“You heard Pete this morning, Nick,” she replied. You’re on a strict diet until your test and I’m gonna make sure you follow it to the letter, so we’re getting lunch at Subwallaby today. It’s good and good for you.”

Nick groaned as he imagined how good a Whopper would taste right about now. “I hate Mondays,” he muttered.

Just eight more days.

#

Seven days before the test.

“Great work, Slick!” Pete exclaimed as the three of them crossed the start-finish line. “That was a 2:19 for that lap,” he continued as he looked down at his stopwatch. “So let’s do a light jog for a lap and then we’ll light the ‘burners again.” Nick nodded his head as they slowed their pace and headed into the turn.

“How’re you feeling?” Judy asked the fox.

“I’m good,” Nick managed. He was breathing hard, but pleasantly surprised that he wasn’t absolutely whipped.

“Glad to hear it,” Pistol commented. “Because, I think you can speed it up a little. You’ve come in under 2:20 every lap so far, so I think we can shoot for a 2:15 on our next timed lap.”

Normally, Nick would have groaned, but that would have required more physical exertion than he felt like expending at the moment, so he just gave a thumbs up, accepting his fate. Man, he hated interval training.

Just seven more days.

#

Six days before the test.

The morning briefing had just ended and Judy was grabbing a key from Ben at the front desk while Nick went up to their office to grab their citation book so they could head out on patrol. The fox yawned as he walked into the office. He was still tired from the early morning workout and Chief Bogo being a little more long-winded than usual at the briefing didn’t help matters. He was so tired that he almost didn’t notice the item sitting on his desk that wasn’t there last night. As he grabbed the book out of the desk drawer and was turning back towards the door, he caught a flash of color in his peripheral vision that seemed out of place. Curious, he turned back towards his desk to see what looked like a greeting card laying on his keyboard. His brow furrowed as he picked it up to examine it. On the front it had a picture of a rabbit wearing vintage flying gear, something like what a World War I fighter pilot would wear. There was a speech balloon above the rabbit containing the words, “A great man once said, ‘Man will fly, but not in our lifetime, not in a thousand years!’” Nick flipped the card open. Inside it read, “Wilbur Wright said that. In 1901. Never give up!”

“Huh,” Nick muttered. He hadn’t known that the inventors of the airplane had at one point been so discouraged.

Then he smiled as he read what was handwritten in blue ink underneath. “I BELIEVE IN YOU!!! YOU CAN DO THIS, NICK!!! LOVE, ‘CARROTS’”

Nick re-read the whole thing a few more times, his smile getting bigger each time. Then something happened that the fox could remember happening only a handful of times in his adult life. Nicholas Wilde began to cry. He stood there for a few minutes, just staring at his best friend’s handwriting as tears ran down his face.

“Do you like it?” a quiet voice suddenly asked from behind him. The smile fell from his face as he whirled around to see his partner standing in the doorway. Evidently she had grown a little tired of waiting for him in the lobby.

He just stared at her for a second before remembering he needed to answer her question. “I love it,” he answered in an equally quiet voice.

“Nick, are you crying?!” Judy whispered.

“No, I think I’ve just got something in my eye,” he said as he wiped at his cheeks and eyes with his free paw.

Judy smiled. “Oh yeah? And what might that be?” she asked, playing along.

Nick put his paw back down and smiled back. “A tiny speck of sentiment,” he admitted, before closing the distance between him and his partner and wrapping her in a tight hug. “Thank you, Judy,” he whispered.

Just six more days.

#

Five days before the test.

“Okay, Slick, you’re on a good pace,” Pete said as the two bunnies and the fox ran side by side through the far turn of the track. “We’re coming up on the last hundred yards. This is where you have to go for broke. Leave it all out on the track. Any time you lost in the first 5 ¾ laps, you make it up here. When we get to that straightaway, you sprint as hard as you can to the line, got it?”

Nick gave a thumbs up.

“Let’s make this a little more interesting, Nick,” Judy said with a sly grin. “You and I race to the line. Loser has to buy the winner coffee.”

Nick grinned back at her. “Oh you are so on!” he panted.

“Okay, we’re almost to the front stretch,” Pete observed. “Ready… ready… Go, go, go!” The three of them took off into a sprint, with the two bunnies starting to pull away from Nick.

“Come on, Nick!” Judy taunted. “Can’tcha catch me? You’re not going to let a girl beat you are you?”

Nick didn’t say anything, but channeled the taunting into motivation. He focused on lengthening his strides, trying to use his slightly longer legs to his advantage. Slowly but surely, he began to gain on the two rabbits as they started to fade down the stretch. When they were only a few steps from the line, the fox found himself a couple of steps behind the siblings with no hope of beating them unless he did something drastic. So with his last ounce of strength, he dove for the line, tumbling across it just as two pairs of rabbit feet charged across. He rolled to a stop on his back and stared up at the sky, trying to get his breathing under control. After a few seconds, Judy and Pete walked back into his line of sight and offered him a paw. He took one of their paws in each of his as they hauled him to his feet. “Call it a tie?” Nick asked his partner with a smile.

Just five more days.

#

Four days before the test.

“I’m gonna run this file down to Ben real quick. I’ll be right back,” Judy told her partner as she jumped down from her desk chair and walked out the open office door.

“Okay,” Nick responded as he watched her leave. He watched the door for a few extra seconds before a mischievous smile began to cross his muzzle.

“Excellent,” he whispered as he quickly opened the bottom drawer of his desk and pulled a still warm chocolate donut from it. “Come to papa,” he whispered as he closed his eyes and began to bring the pastry to his mouth.

“Hey Nick, can you- Nick!”

The fox’s eyes flashed open to see a rather peeved bunny cop running towards him.

“You know you can’t have these right now!” Judy exclaimed as she grabbed the donut from his paw.

“Aw, c’mon Carrots!” he whined. “So I was gonna have one doughnut. Big, fat, hairy deal!”

But Judy was having none of it. “Open your desk drawers,” she ordered with her arms crossed.

“What?”

“You heard me.”

Nick stared down at her for a second before turning with a sigh to open each drawer for her to inspect.

“Just one, huh?” Judy asked as she pulled the only other doughnut he had from the bottom drawer. “You’ll thank me for this come Tuesday, Nick,” she said as she walked back out the door, probably to give away the two offending desserts.

“Yeah, yeah, yeah,” Nick muttered with another sigh as he turned back toward his desk. He looked at the card she had given him earlier that week for a moment before picking it up from where he had propped it up on his desk. He opened it up and re-read what she had written. He smiled. “C’mon Nick,” he said to himself. “You can do it. She believes you can do it, so you can do it.” He set the card back down and returned to work.

Just four more days.

#

Three days before the test.

“C’mon Slick, you’ve got this! Just a few more steps,” Pete encouraged as he, Judy, and Nick ran down the front straightaway. “Keep up with me. You’re gonna make it. And that… is… time!” he exclaimed as they crossed the finish line.

Nick, to his credit, was no longer collapsing at the end of each run, but he did lean forward and put his paws on his knees for a few seconds before straightening up again. “What’s the time?” he panted before accepting his water bottle from Judy.

“That was a 12:18.48, Slick. A couple more days of this and you’ll have no problem on Tuesday,”

Nick nodded. Almost there.

Just three more days.

#

Two days before the test.

“You ready to go, Fluff?” Nick asked as he knocked on her apartment door, dressed in his PTUs. “We don’t want to keep Peter Cottontail waiting.” It was early afternoon and she should have had enough time to get back from church and change.

“Yeah, I’ll be right out,” she called out. About thirty seconds passed before he heard the lock click and she opened the door. “Hi,” she greeted him with a smile. “Come on in here a second. There’s something I need to give you before we go.”

Nick was confused but followed her into her apartment, leaving the door open. “So, how was church today?” he asked in an attempt to make conversation.

“Well, it’s funny you should mention that,” she replied as she picked up a small cardboard box off her desk and walked over to her bed, “Because what I have to give you actually came from church.” She sat down on her bed and patted the spot next to her, indicating for him to sit. He did so and she handed him the box.

“What is it?” he asked warily. “It’s not heavy enough to be a Bible.”

“Noooo, it’s not a Bible,” she said, slightly exasperated. “Open it and find out!” she continued excitedly.

He lifted the unsealed flaps and pulled out several sheets of folded construction paper before setting the box to the side. Upon closer inspection, they appeared to be handmade cards.

“So a few weeks back, I began teaching the 1st Grade Sunday School class at my church, and the past couple weeks, we’ve been talking about the importance of encouraging others,” she explained as he began sifting through the cards. “I wanted to give the kids an example of encouragement, so last week I told them a little about your situation and the card I was going to get for you. For whatever reason, they got really excited about the whole thing and asked if they could make cards for you. So today, I brought in some construction paper and crayons and stuff and they spent the whole class making these,” she finished.

Nick didn’t respond right away, but continued to look through the cards. When he finally did respond, it was in the form of a question. “What’s that?” he asked as he pointed to where a child had crudely scribbled “Phipilians 4:13.”

Judy looked down at the card and chuckled. “It should read ‘Philippians 4:13.’ It’s a Bible verse. It says, ‘I can do all things through Him who strengthens me.’”

Nick nodded slightly. He stared at the card for a few more seconds before he let a sharp breath out of his nose and began slowly shaking his head.

Judy was puzzled by this. “Nick? What’s wrong?” she asked softly.

Nick turned to look at her with a smile. “Not a darn thing.”

“Then what-”

“You are amazing, Judy Hopps. You know that?”

Judy blushed and turned away a little. “Flattery will get you nowhere,” she said with a slight smile.

“No, I’m serious, Judy! You are the most amazing, incredible person I have ever met. You became a cop when practically everyone around you said it couldn’t be done, and not only did you prove them wrong on that point, but you became one of the best in the business. But you didn’t stop with your own accomplishments. You believed in me when everyone else said you shouldn’t trust me any farther than you could throw me. You brought me out of a life of misery and gave me something to live for. But you didn’t even stop with me either. Now you’re taking the time out of your already busy life to invest in the next generation. You are the most loving, selfless, generous, compassionate, encouraging, trusting, brave, courageous bunny, woman, or person I have ever met. And I know I’ve said this to you and Pistol more times than I can count over the past week and a half, but… thank you. Thank you so much, Judy.”

Judy stared up at him, her eyes watering a little bit. Her heart must have been beating a thousand miles an hour. She was so overwhelmed. Nobody had ever said anything like that to her before. After a few seconds, she found her voice. “Do… do you really mean all that Nick?”

“With all my heart.”

She hesitated for a few more seconds before speaking again. “I… don’t know what to say.”

The fox chuckled. “How about just, ‘you’re welcome.’”

“You’re welcome,” she repeated softly as she placed her paw on top of his. She wasn’t exactly sure what had just happened between the two of them or just what the significance of it was, but she was bound and determined to find out. She had a lot of praying and thinking in her future.

Just two more days.

#

One day before the test.

“Time!” Pete called out as the three of them crossed the finish line on their last mile and a half before the big day. Nick slowed to a stop and clasped his hands together on top of his head, trying to control his breathing. After a few seconds, Judy approached him and handed him his water bottle; something she had taken to doing for him at the end of every workout. He gave her a weak smile before taking a sip.

“What was it?” Nick asked after a few more sips.

Pete looked down at his stopwatch. “A 12:02.67,” he said as he looked back up at the fox.

“Oh,” Nick replied, looking down at his feet. He still hadn’t broken twelve minutes

Judy noticed the slightly dejected look on her partner’s face. “Hey, Nick, look at me,” she commanded.

The fox slowly looked up at her.

“You have nothing to be upset about,” she told him as she stared into his green eyes. “You’re only two seconds off the pace. It’s nothing. You can easily take care of that tomorrow. And regardless of how it turns out, you should be proud of yourself. You’ve made a lot of progress in a very short amount of time. I’m very proud of you,” she smiled.

“We both are,” Pete agreed.

Nick smiled. “Thanks guys.”

Just one more day.

#

The floodlights were already on and the track was bathed in the artificial light when Nick, Judy, and Pete arrived at quarter after six on Tuesday morning. There had been no clouds the night before so it was a little chillier that morning than it had been the past few days. The cops and pilot visibly shivered in their thin PTU shirt and shorts.

“Ugh, why did it have to be so cold today of all days?” Nick complained, rubbing his arms with his paws, trying to warm up as the three descended the concrete stairs to the track.

“Oh, don’t you worry, Slick,” Pete responded with a grin. “You won’t be cold for very long.”

Nick groaned in anticipation of the run Pete was referring to.

The three reached the bottom of the stairs and began walking to the other end of the front straightaway and the start-finish line.

“Hey, where’s Clawhauser?” Judy asked as they reached the line. “Isn’t he supposed to administer this test?”

“Well, do you have his number, Jude?” Pete asked.

“Yeah.”

“Okay, why don’t you go ahead and call him while I get Nick stretched out,” Pete suggested.

“Okay,” Judy stepped a few feet away to make the call while Nick and Pete stretched. After a couple of minutes she joined the other two in their stretches. “He’s on his way. He’s just running a little late.”

A few minutes later, the heavyset cheetah came jogging up to them with what looked like a donut box tucked under his arm.

“Please, Ben. Please do not tell me that the reason you were running late was to pick up a box of donuts,” Nick groaned as he finished a set of lunges.

“Hey, you can’t expect me to administer a test on an empty stomach!” Ben defended himself before popping a donut into his mouth.

“YOU’RE Benjamin Clawhauser?” Pete suddenly spoke up, a little surprised that the rather rotund cheetah in front of him was the officer his sister had mentioned a few days earlier.

“Oh, I’m sorry!” Judy cut in before Ben could respond. “I forgot you two haven’t met. Ben, this is my older brother, Captain Peter Hopps. He’s a B-52 pilot out at Foxchild and he’s been helping Nick prepare for this. Pete, this is Officer Benjamin Clawhauser, the day shift dispatcher at Precinct 1. He administers most of the fitness tests for the department.”

“Oh, Pete! It’s so good to meet you!” Ben rushed over to Pete, grabbed his paw and shook it violently. “And thank you so much for helping Nick with this whole thing! We’d really miss him and his jokes around the precinct.”

Pete chuckled. “Well, don’t thank me yet,” he replied as he massaged his now slightly sore right arm with his left paw. “Slick here still has to take what I’ve taught him and put it to good use!” he continued before giving Nick one solid pat on the back.

“Are you ready to go, Nick?” Ben turned toward the fox. “Judy said you were already stretching when she called.”

“Yeah, I’m ready,” he replied with a sigh. “Let’s go ahead and get this over with.”

“Okay, here’s your score sheet,” the cheetah said as he handed Nick a piece of paper from a small stack he had on top of the donut box. “I just need you to fill in your age, sex, species, height, weight, today’s date, and print your witness’s name here. I assume that’s going to be Judy, since she’s the only other ZPD officer here.”

“There aren’t any regulations preventing the witness from running with the person taking the test, is there?” Judy asked as Nick began to fill in the information.

Ben thought for a moment. “I’ve never seen it done, but no, as far as I know it’s completely legal. You gonna be Nick’s pacer?”

“Pete and I are gonna switch off every lap,” she replied.

“Here you go,” Nick cut in as he handed the newly filled out sheet back to Ben.

“Great!” Ben exclaimed as he accepted the sheet. “I just need to read you the legalese and we can start.”

“Legalese?” Nick questioned.

“Brace yourself,” Pete muttered in reply, inferring that they were about to hear something similar to what was read prior to Air Force Physical Fitness Assessments.

“You are about to complete the Zootopia Police Department Fitness Assessment,” Ben began reading aloud from another sheet of paper. “You are presumed fit to participate based on your completion of the FSQ. You may re-accomplish the FSQ if medical concerns have developed since completion, but must do so prior to beginning the FA. If you experience injury or illness during the FA, you will have the option of being evaluated at the Zootopia Police Academy Infirmary, but your test may still count. If the medical evaluation validates your illness/injury your supervisor may invalidate the test results. If the test is invalidated, you will be required to retest within 5 days. At no time will a back-dated ZPD Form 469 (fitness exemption) be accepted. This fitness assessment consists of a 1.5 mile run. This 1.5 mile timed run is used to measure cardio-respiratory fitness. Prior to beginning the 1.5 mile run, you may complete up to a 3 minute warm up. You will line up behind the starting line and will be instructed to begin running as I start the stopwatch. No physical assistance from anyone or anything is permitted. Pacing is permitted if there is no physical contact and is not a hindrance to other runners, if any. You are required to stay on and complete the entire marked course. Leaving the course is disqualifying and terminates the test. Your completion time will be recorded when you cross the finish line and you are required to complete a cool down for approximately 5 minutes. If at any time you are feeling in poor health, you are to stop running immediately and you will be given assistance,” Ben looked up to Nick. “Are there any questions?”

Nick stared at the cheetah for a couple of seconds, an unamused expression on his face. “Really?” he finally asked.

“I need you to answer the question, Nick,” Ben responded, displaying his rare serious side.

Nick sighed before answering. “No, I don’t have any questions.”

“Okay,” Ben made a notation on his sheet before looking back up. “Alright, whenever you’re ready, step up to the line and we’ll start. I’ll give a countdown from three, then say ‘Go’ as I start the stopwatch.”

Nick and Pete took their place at the starting line, Nick on the inside edge of the track with Pete just to his right. Pete and Judy held their index fingers over the start button on their own stopwatches. Even though only the time on Ben’s stopwatch would be considered official, the two of them would use theirs to make sure Nick was maintaining the proper pace throughout each lap.

“In 3, 2, 1, go!” Ben called out. Three beeps were heard as the stopwatches started and the fox cop and bunny airman headed into the first turn.

The two ran in silence for most of the first lap, the only exception being a reminder from Pete for Nick to keep his upper body loose when he noticed his shoulders starting to tighten up. The two of them crossed the line to complete the first lap and Pete peeled off to the side to let Judy take his place for the next lap. The bunny pilot looked down at his stopwatch to see the split. A 1:58.49, right on pace.

Judy was much more talkative than Pete was. “Come on Nick. You’re doing great. You were about a second and a half ahead of pace for that first lap. Keep it up. You still feeling good?” Nick gave her a thumbs up. “Good. Just keep going. One foot in front of the other. One step at a time.” She was pleased to see that Nick was, at least for the moment, showing no signs of a struggle to stay on pace. Soon they made their way back around to the line and Judy peeled off while Pete took over for the third lap.

“You’re doing great, Slick,” Pete told him midway through the first turn. “You’re right on pace. Keep it up. Try to slow that breathing down if you can.” As they lumbered down the backstretch, Pete noticed that the fox was starting to fade a hair, to about a half-body length behind the rabbit. “Try to stay with me Nick. You’re doing great.” Nick slowly pulled back even with the rabbit as they entered the far turn. “There you go, Slick. You got it. You’re almost halfway there. Keep it up.” They exited the turn and raced down the frontstretch. As they reached the line, Pete peeled off and once again Judy took her place alongside the fox as he entered the fourth lap.

“Keep it up, Nick” Judy encouraged. “You’re halfway there and you’re still right on pace. That was a 5:58.87 when you crossed the line. Don’t slow down. You’re doing great.”

As they started down the backstretch, Nick spoke for the first time since starting the run. “Hurts,” he panted.

“What part?” Judy asked, concerned he might be getting shin splints or some other injury.

“Everything,” he panted in response.

Judy gave a knowing smile. He was just getting fatigued. “I know it does, but you gotta keep going. The more it hurts, the more I want you to think about your job and how good it’s gonna feel when you cross that line in a few minutes knowing you’re still a cop. You got this. I believe in you, Nick.”

Nick didn’t say anything, but smiled briefly as they entered the far turn. Before he knew it, they had come all the way back around to the line again and he was entering his fifth lap with the bunny pilot running alongside him once more.

“That was an 8:02.48 at the line Slick,” Pete informed the fox. “It’s no big deal, you’re doing great. It’s only three seconds you have to pick up over two laps. It’s nothing. You got this.” But by the time they had reached the backstretch, Nick had started to fall behind again. He was now fully five body lengths behind Pete. “Come on Nick. Stay with me. You’re doing great. Don’t let me get away.”

“Can’t,” Nick panted. “Ugh.”

“Yes you can,” Pete encouraged. “Don’t try to do it all at once. Just lengthen your stride the tiniest bit and you’ll be even with me by the time we get back around to the line. Come on, Slick. You’ve got this.” Nick groaned but did as Pete said. Slowly, he did begin to catch back up, but he was still a little behind pace as they neared the line. “9:58, 9:59, 10 minutes, 10:01, 10:02, 10:03, 10:04, 10:05!” Pete read off his stopwatch, stopping his count as they crossed the line. The bunny airman peeled away as his sister took her place beside the fox one last time as he entered his final lap. “Go get’m Slick! You got this!” Pete yelled one final bit of encouragement after him.

“I don’t know if he’s gonna make it,” Ben commented nervously to Pete once the rabbit had stopped next to him.

“Oh, he’ll make it,” Pete declared confidently, but inside, he was nervous and praying hard. ‘God, please help Nick. Give him strength.’ The two of them continued to glance nervously back and forth between their stopwatches and the two cops as they circled the track. By the time they entered the far turn, Nick was still five seconds off the pace. It was gonna come down to the final sprint. Pete and Ben began screaming at the top of their lungs, encouraging Nick to push as hard as he could, not really considering whether or not he could hear them on the other end of the track. 

“Don’t slow down! Lengthen those strides!” Pete hollered.

“Come on Nick! You can make it!” Ben screamed.

They stopped yelling for just a moment while Nick and Judy were midway through the far turn. And that’s when they heard it. If one didn’t know better, it sounded like an irate bunny.

“YOU GIVE ME YOUR BEST! YOU KEEP GOING! YOU KEEP DRIVING! THAT’S IT! DON’T QUIT ‘TIL YOU GOT NOTHING LEFT!” Judy screamed at her partner, urging him on.

Ben, who had never seen this side of Judy before, looked down at Pete with a half surprised/half questioning look. Pete looked back up at him and shrugged before they both turned their now silent attention back to the bunny and fox cop.

“YOUR VERY BEST! YOUR VERY BEST! DON’T QUIT ON ME! KEEP GOING!” She paused briefly as Nick’s lips appeared to move. “I KNOW IT HURTS! KEEP DRIVING! KEEP DRIVING! DO NOT QUIT ON ME! IT’S ALL HEART FROM HERE! THIRTY MORE STEPS!” They saw Nick’s lips move again. “THEN LET IT BURN! DON’T STOP! KEEP GOING! TWENTY MORE STEPS! KEEP GOING! DON’T QUIT! DON’T QUIT! DON’T QUIT! NICHOLAS WILDE, YOU DON’T QUIT ON ME! KEEP GOING! TEN MORE STEPS! COME ON, NICK! THREE MORE! TWO MORE! ONE MORE!”

Nick collapsed to the ground as the two of them crossed the line and the familiar beep of three stopwatches being hacked was heard. Nick lifted himself onto his hands and knees and stared at the ground as he panted quietly, “That’s gotta be 12 minutes. That’s gotta be 12 minutes, I don’t have anymore!”

“Look up, Nick,” Pete said gently.

The fox slowly lifted his head to see the bunny airman squatting in front of him, holding up his stopwatch for the fox to read. He blinked a few times to rid his eyes of some sweat that had ran down into them. Once his vision had cleared, he read the time out loud. “11:59.23.”

“Congratulations, Slick,” Pete smiled. “You’re still a cop.”

Nick let out a huge breath before allowing himself to collapse back onto his stomach with a smile. But he didn’t stay down for long, as he felt two large paws grab him underneath his arms and haul him into the air. “Oh, you did it, Nick! You did it!” Ben exclaimed happily as he swung Nick around a few times before roughly setting him down on his feet. He staggered backward a few steps and almost fell on his rear end, but another set of paws caught him in time. He regained his balance before turning around to see who had caught him.

Most people could probably think of something more beautiful than a lady rabbit wearing ZPD PTUs that were slightly damp with sweat, but as Nick looked at his partner, he couldn’t think of a single thing. “Hey,” he said quietly, a smile gracing his face.

She smiled back at him. “Hey,” she replied in an equally quiet tone.

“Thank you.”

“Your welcome.” Neither of them said anything for a moment, until Judy declared, “I’m really proud of you, Nicky. Like really, really freaking proud,” before crushing him in a hug, which he was happy to return. Nick had gone through some ups and downs in the past couple of weeks, but at that moment, he felt on top of the world.

#

The atmosphere was jubilant as Nick, Judy, and Pete ascended the stairs to the parking lot a few minutes later.

“I’m really proud of you, Slick,” Pete was saying. “There aren’t too many people out there who can do what you did in the amount of time you did it in.”

“Thanks, Pistol. I couldn’t have done it without help from you two though,” Nick replied. “I can’t thank you enough for everything you’ve done.”

“Oh, you always had it in you, Nick,” Judy said with a smile. “You just needed a little help to bring it out. But… maybe you should start joining Pete and I on our runs on a regular basis so we don’t have to go through this again!”

The three of them chuckled. “Sounds like a plan! I-” Nick paused as he heard his phone vibrate inside his gym bag. “Hang on a sec, guys.” The three of them stopped as Nick stooped down and dug his phone out of the bag and opened up the text message he had just received. His face quickly fell. “Ah, jeez,” he muttered.

“What’s up?” Pete asked.

“It’s a text from Officer Wolfard,” Nick explained. “I’ve been talking with him the past couple days about the possibility of him moving in with me and splitting the rent, but he says he found another place that’s a better deal.” He sighed as he put his phone back in his bag and the three continued walking to their cars. “That’s the fifth person that’s turned me down. I can’t afford the rent on my own, not with this paycheck. I really don’t want to, but if I can’t find somebody soon, I’m gonna have to find a smaller, cheaper place.”

“Wait a minute,” Judy suddenly realized. “Pete, aren’t you still looking for a place to live?”

“Yeah, I am,” the bunny airman replied. “I’ve been looking since I first arrived at Foxchild, but there just aren’t very many available places to live in this crowded city. And all the available places I HAVE found are too expensive. And to make matters worse, I’ve almost completely used up the 30 days of free lodging the Air Force gives you when you PCS [Permanent Change of Station; it’s basically when a service member is reassigned and moves from one base to another]. They’re going to kick me out of billeting [basically an on-base hotel run by the Air Force] on Friday. I don’t know what I’m gonna do if I don’t find a place by then.”

A sly grin began to grow across the fox’s muzzle. “Really…?”

#

“Okay Captain Hopps, on this one I need you to sign here, here, and initial here,” the mover, a beaver, explained as he and Pete went through all the paperwork that was required to complete the shipment of household goods.

While they were doing that, Nick stood a few feet away, curiously examining all the items that had just been unpacked in a room that, until a few days ago, he had used for storage, but was now Pete’s new bedroom. The fox could tell that the rabbit was an avid reader. There were several stacks of mostly nonfiction books regarding aviation, the military, history, and theology, but there were a few fiction books in the mix as well, most notably a set of Tom Clawncy novels.

His new roommate was also a movie buff, judging by the stacks of movies on Blu-Ray. Plenty of modern films, but also a sizable number of the older stuff too, or at least he assumed they were older, because he didn’t recognize some of the titles, like “Strategic Hare Command” and “Those Magnificent Mammals in Their Flying Machines.” But there were also some he did recognize, like “American Grrfitti.”

There were also several plaques and framed certificates, including a diploma for a Bachelor of Science in Aeronautical Studies from Lemming-Riddle Aeronautical University, Preytona Beach as well as an Air Force officer commissioning certificate and a certificate certifying graduation from Air Force Undergraduate Pilot Training Class 13-06 at Prance AFB, Oklahoma.

As he wandered toward the back corner of the room, he noticed what at first looked like another small stack of books sitting next to an Air Force helmet bag. However, upon closer inspection, he realized that they were actually photo albums, and they looked kind of old. His curiosity piqued, he picked up the one on the top of the stack, sat down on the bed, and began to flip through it. His eyes quickly went wide and a grin started to spread across his face as he realized what he was looking at.

“Jackpot!” he whispered to himself as he gazed upon the baby pictures of various Hopps children, all girls. He quickly began turning the pages, in search of one rabbit in particular.

“Whatcha got there?” a voice suddenly startled Nick, causing him to jump about a foot off the bed.

“Oh, jeez! Don’t scare me like that, Pistol!” Nick exclaimed, clutching his chest. As he calmed himself down, he noticed that they were now the only two in the room. “Movers are gone?” he asked in an attempt to change the subject.

“Yeah, just finished signing the paperwork. But that still doesn’t answer my question,” he replied with a blank expression and his arms folded, still clearly expecting an answer.

“Oh, well, it’s just… um, I was just…”

“You know Judy wouldn’t be very happy if you saw her baby pictures,” Pete cut him off, still wearing the blank expression.

Nick gulped.

“So I won’t tell her when I go through them with you later this evening,” Pete finished, still wearing the blank expression.

“I’m sorry, Pistol,” Nick began apologizing. “I was just- Wait, what?” The two of them sat there and stared at each other for a moment, before Nick noticed the corners of the bunny’s lips began to curl up.

“Wow, Slick,” Pete chuckled. “For a former hustler, you’re not much of a challenge! Now come on. I just got a text from Jude. She’s already at the restaurant waiting for us,” he said as he turned and began to walk out of the room.

Nick stared after the rabbit for a moment as a grin began to cross his muzzle. He set the album beside him on the bed and stood up. “I think I’m going to like having a roommate,” he said to himself as he followed Pete out of the room.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! Bet you weren’t expecting Pete and Nick to become roommates, were you?

A disclaimer I would like to make: aspects of the physical fitness training done in this story are not necessarily realistic. There are some aspects where I used knowledge I’ve learned in the military, but there are others that I simply made up. No need to review and point them out; I’m aware of them.

Like I said in the opening, I’m no longer setting target dates for updates, so the next installment will come out when it comes out. But don’t fear, I AM working on it! So until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	5. Stan Schulz

Stan Schulz

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! As always, thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

This story takes place roughly four months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy.

Zootopia, Comin’ In on a Wing and a Prayer, NASCAR, the Kansas City Royals, the Kansas City Chiefs, the Seattle Mariners, the Seattle Seahawks, the Super Bowl, and Facing the Giants belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Here is the fifth installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: Stan Schulz!

18Feb17 Update: If you’re interested, the name of Pete’s Air Force pilot training base in “Mistaken Identities and Fitness Tests” has been updated. Thank you to Robert Escher for the suggestion. I can’t believe I didn’t think of it myself!

#

Peter “Pistol” Hopps hummed a tune to himself as he walked down the hallways of the ZPD, on his way to his sister’s and friend’s office. It was a little after five in the afternoon and he had just gotten off work out at the base. The sun was shining on this warm, beautiful late spring day, he had capped off his work day with a relatively short three hour training flight, and he had gotten word that he had been selected for aircraft commander school, so needless to say, the rabbit was in a good mood. He was in such a good mood that his humming soon turned to singing, though he kept it quiet. He didn’t want to disturb the cops who were still working after all.

“With a full crew aboard, and our trust in the Lord, coming in on a wing and a pray- OOF!” A few feet from the office, his singing was interrupted by the gray blur that came flying out the door and straight at him at full speed. The collision knocked both him and the blur to the ground in a heap. As Pete reoriented himself, he looked to his left to see his younger sister scrambling to her feet and grabbing a piece of paper she had dropped in the collision.

“Hi Pete! Bye Pete!” she quickly called to him as she took off down the hall in the direction he had come.

Pete stared after his sister for a few seconds until she turned a corner and disappeared. “Woah. She gone,” he muttered to himself, his mild country accent becoming slightly more pronounced on the last word. He stood to his feet and dusted off his flight suit before walking the few remaining feet to the office.

“Hey Slick,” he greeted his roommate as he gave a brief knock on the open doorframe and entered the room. “Where’s Jude off to in such a hurry?” he asked before grabbing the spare office chair and rolling it over next to where Nick was sitting at his desk. He turned the chair so the back was to the desk and plopped down into it.

“Hey Pistol,” the fox briefly turned away from his computer to return the greeting with a smile. “She wanted to catch the chief before he left for the day. Had something she needed to give him,” he explained before turning back to the computer.

“Mmm,” Pete acknowledged as he shifted around and got comfortable in the chair. “You just about ready to go?”

“Yeah, just about,” Nick replied. “I just need to finish typing this e-mail and I’ll be ready.”

“Sounds good.”

“Thanks again for driving Carrots and me to and from work this week,” Nick continued as he turned to face Pete again. “I can’t believe both our cars broke and ended up in the shop at the same time like that.”

“Oh, think nothing of it,” Pete reassured him with a smile. “These things happen from time to time. Besides, what are friends and family for anyway?”

“Well, thanks again all the same.”

“You bet!”

The room fell silent as Nick turned back to his computer and Pete began looking around the office. He had only been in here once or twice before and not for very long, so this was the first time he had a chance to really see how Judy and Nick had made it their own. Judy’s desk was cluttered with personal items, mostly pictures of family or Nick, but a few other items too, like her MASCAR die-casts and her Zootopia Royals and Chiefs ball caps and posters. Nick’s desk, on the other hand, was far more sparsely populated. There were only two pictures, one of him and Judy in uniform, and the other seemed to be of him as a rather young child with who he assumed were his parents. There was also the card Judy had given him the week prior to his fitness test. None of those seemed odd to Pete, but then he looked further down the desk. Tacked up on the wall above Nick’s computer was a Seacattle Mariners flag. And was that a Seacattle Seahawks Supurr Bowl XLVIII Champions hat sitting next to the keyboard? Pete’s understanding was that Nick had been born and raised in Zootopia. So why was he a fan of the Mariners and Seahawks and not the Royals and Chiefs? Although, even though Judy had told him a lot about the fox, there were still some things about him that even SHE didn’t know. Maybe he should ask him about it.

Suddenly, the ringing landline phone on his sister’s desk jarred him from his thoughts. Nick pushed off from his desk and rolled his chair across the hard wood floor, picking up the receiver almost as soon as he came to a stop in front of Judy’s desk.

“Zootopia Police Department. Officer Wilde speaking,” he greeted in his professional cop voice. However, Pete noticed the change in demeanor that quickly followed. “Yes, Mr. Schulz, what can I do for you?” the fox asked as his shoulders sagged and he rested his forehead on his free paw and his elbow on the desk. He still kept his voice professional, but Pete could tell he was not happy.

“No, I’m afraid she’s not, can I take a message?” Nick asked as he reached for the message pad on Judy’s desk. “Uh-huh…….Uh-huh…….Last Thursday, you say?........Uh-huh…….Three-six-one-nine. Okaaayyy, got it. Alright Mr. Schulz, I will let her know you called,” he finished as he smiled his best fake smile, even though Mr. Schulz couldn’t see it. Old habits die hard. “You have a good day now. Uh, rrright. Bye.” Nick hung up the phone with a sigh and leaned his head back in the chair.

“Problem?” Pete asked, noticing his reaction.

“Hmm?” Nick asked as he turned his head to look at Pete. “Oh, no, not a problem. More of an annoyance really,” he explained as he rolled himself back over to his desk. “That was Stan Schulz. The guy’s got way too much time on his hands. He knows that Carrots and I often patrol in his neighborhood and so he calls us at least once a week to-” He cut himself off when he saw the change in expression on Pete’s face. “What are you smiling about?”

“I just had a GREAT idea. You wanna mess with Jude a little bit?”

A mischievous grin spread across the fox’s face. “Always. What do you got in mind?”

“Okay, so here’s what we oughta do…”

#

A few minutes later, Judy walked back into the office, minus the piece of paper she had been carrying when she left. “Hi, Pete,” she greeted. “Sorry to run into you and then run off like that, but I had to catch the chief before he left for the day,” she explained as she took a seat at her desk.

“Oh, no worries, Jude,” Pete assured her as he looked up from his phone. “You just about ready to go?”

“Uh, almost,” she replied. “Let me pack up my stuff here.”

“Oh, Fluff,” Nick spoke up. “Stan Schulz called for you while you were out. I left the message there on your desk.

“Oh, great,” she muttered sarcastically as she picked up the message and looked it over. “Stan Schulz. Halright,” she let out a sigh as she tossed it back on her desk. “I’ll deal with this tomorrow. It’s quitting time anyway; I don’t feel like dealing with this right now.”

“Stan Schulz,” Pete repeated slowly, considering the name. “Isn’t that the cartoonist?”

“That’s CHARLES Schulz,” Judy corrected as she began packing her things.

“No, I thought Charles Schulz was that guy who flew across the ocean in the Spirit of St. Andrew,” Nick chimed in.

“That’s Charles LINDBOARGH in the Spirit of St. Louis,” she corrected once again, a little surprised that Pete, the aviation buff that he was, hadn’t said anything.

“No, Lindboargh’s a type of cheese,” Pete interjected, his brow furrowed.

“LIMBOARGER’s the cheese! Lindboargh’s the man!” Judy corrected once more, surprised and a little exasperated.

“No, Lindboargh was that blimp that blew up and killed all those people,” Nick continued.

Judy stopped packing for a moment, poked her head around the back of her chair, and stared at Nick with slightly squinted eyes and her mouth hanging slightly open. After a couple of seconds, she declared incredulously, “That’s the Hindenboarg!” She scoffed and shook her head before turning back around and continuing to pack.

“Naw, Hindenboarg is where you go skiing in Tennessee,” Pete declared in a voice that indicated he thought he had at least gotten this one right.

“That’s GATLINBOARG!” Judy exclaimed in frustration.

“Oh, you mean like the country music group, the Gatlinboarg Brothers?” Nick questioned, now struggling to keep the grin off his face.

Pete and Nick flinched as Judy whirled around in her chair and sent a cheap plastic pen flying through the air between the two males before it hit the opposite wall with a WHAM and fell to Nick’s desk. “You two have lost your ever-lovin’ minds,” Judy muttered as she turned back around and grabbed the last of her things.

Pete and Nick just smiled at each other before fist bumping.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! I know the last installment and the next installment are intense in a few places, so I wanted to give y’all something light in between. Until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	6. The 12th Fox

The 12th Fox

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! As always, thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

This story takes place roughly four months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy, about a week after the last story.

Zootopia, Chevrolet, the University of Washington, Seattle-Tacoma International Airport, the Boeing Aircraft Company, Boeing Field, the King Dome, the Seattle Mariners, the Seattle Seahawks, and the Super Bowl belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Here is the sixth installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: The 12th Fox!

#

“He’s going to what school again?” Nick asked the bunny in the patrol car passenger seat. It was late afternoon and the two of them were headed back to the precinct after a day of patrolling in the Rainforest District.

“Aircraft commander school!” Judy replied excitedly, the grin spread wide across her face. “You’re his roommate. Didn’t he tell you about it?”

“Pistol just said he would be gone for a few months while he went down to Barksdale for some training. I know there’s a lot of top secret, hush-hush kinda stuff that those guys do, so I didn’t want to press him on it,” the fox explained as he made a left onto the main thoroughfare out of the Rainforest District.

“Oh, he’s so modest,” Judy chuckled. “’Some training,’ indeed. Okay, this is how Pete explained it to me. So you know how on airliners you have a pilot and a co-pilot?”

“Yeah.”

“Well, you have the same thing on B-52s, except the Air Force calls them the aircraft commander and the pilot. When you first start flying the B-52s, you’re the pilot, not the aircraft commander, and you sit in the right seat. When the Air Force thinks you’re ready, they send you to AC school where they train you to be an aircraft commander, lead a crew, and fly the jet from the left seat. It’s a really big deal because you’re ultimately responsible for the airplane and the lives of the rest of the crew.”

“So, basically natural career progression,” Nick summarized as they entered the tunnel through the Rainforest District border wall.

“But, that’s just it!” Judy exclaimed, getting a little more excited. “For Pete, it’s NOT natural! They usually don’t sent you to AC school until you’re a mid-level Captain. Pete just pinned on Captain a little over a year and a half ago, so he’s ahead of the curve! The Air Force must be really impressed with him!”

“Huh.”

“Oh, come on, Nick!” the bunny exclaimed, practically bouncing up and down in her seat. “Aren’t you at least a little excited for him?!”

“Oh, I’m happy for him, of course,” he replied in the same bored tone of voice he had been using for the duration of the conversation.

Judy stopped bouncing and squinted up at her partner as they exited the tunnel into Savanah Central. “Are you feeling alright?” she asked slowly. “You’ve seemed a bit… I don’t know… off, I guess, all day today.”

“I’m fine,” the fox attempted to reassure her. “Just thinking about a few things.”

“What about?”

“Oh, nothing important.”

“It’s obviously important enough to have kept you distracted today,” Judy countered. “Are you sure you don’t-”

Nick cut her off. “I appreciate your concern, Carrots. I really do. But I really would rather not talk about it, okay? Trust me, you will be the first one I come to if I change my mind.”

“Hmmmm,” Judy acknowledged skeptically with squinted eyes, but didn’t say anything else. Nick was a great friend to her, but his evasiveness could be so frustrating sometimes. This was just going to be another one of those occasions where she’d have to monitor the situation carefully and pray for the best.

They rode in silence for the next few minutes. Judy was just starting to doze off when Nick suddenly broke the silence. “Oh, geez. Really?!”

The bunny cop’s ears perked straight up and instinctively began swiveling, trying to ID what Nick had reacted to. “What’s wrong?” she asked.

“Look,” Nick replied grimly as he pointed forward. Judy looked forward at the car ahead of them, a yellow Chevroneigh Impala, which was swerving all over the lanes in his direction of travel and occasionally even drifting into oncoming traffic before jerking back to the right side of the road.

“You gotta be kidding me!” Judy exclaimed. “It’s not even 5 o’clock yet!”

“I guess some idiots just can’t wait to start hitting the booze,” Nick muttered darkly.

“Roof lights’ lit,” Judy informed him as she reached over and flicked on the rotating lights.

“Roger.”

The Impala soon pulled over to the side of the road and Nick maneuvered the patrol car in behind it. As Judy grabbed her door handle and began to step out of the car, she heard the driver side door open as well. She turned to look over and saw Nick stepping out of the car. “What are you doing?” she asked. “I thought it was my turn?”

“I’d like to tag along on this one if you don’t mind,” the fox replied as he leaned down to look through the car at her.

She was about to protest, but the stone cold seriousness of the look on his face gave her pause. He seemed to be on edge about something. It was probably nothing more than a mild concern about this, their first DUI stop together, but there was still the possibility that whatever had been affecting him throughout the day was still in play. She wasn’t thrilled about the idea, but after a few more moment’s hesitation, she relented with a quick, “Okay,” and the two began walking up to the Impala.

When they reached the driver’s window, it was already rolled down and the two cops were greeted by a pig with bloodshot eyes. “’Ssss there a prrrroblem, officers?” the pig asked lazily.

“License and registration, please,” Nick responded in a rather clipped tone, almost as if he was holding something back.

“Oh ssssure, ssssure,” the pig responded. “Let me just dig… that… out,” he continued slowly as he began digging around in his glove box. When he was finally able to produce both items, Nick snatched them out of his hand and began looking them over.

While Nick did that, Judy turned her attention to the pig. “Sir, have you been drinking today?”

“Oh just a (hic) little,” the pig responded. “A man’s gotta keep warm, ya know.”

Nick looked up from the license, “Mr. Hoofson, it’s summer. It’s 90 degrees outside.”

“Seeeee!!!! It’s workin,’” Mr. Hoofson countered.

“Step out of the car please, Mr. Hoofson,” Judy ordered before turning to Nick. “Breathalyzer’s in the trunk, right?”

“Should be.”

“’K. You got him handled while I grab it real quick?”

“Yeah, I got it.”

Judy turned and went to grab the kit from the patrol car. When she returned, she found her partner and the pig in a rather heated discussion. From what she could gather, the pig was demanding leniency, and Nick was having none of it. But instead of trying to defuse the pig’s fury, the fox was matching him word for word, escalating the argument to the point that, if Judy didn’t know better, she thought Nick might throw a punch!

“Hey! Hey!” she called out as she approached. “What’s going on here?!”

If it had been anyone else interrupting the argument, Nick probably would have ignored them, but he had too much respect for Judy, so he just glared at the pig and muttered, “Nothing.”

“It better not be,” Judy chastised. “Blow into this tube, please Mr. Hoofson.” When he had done so, she pulled the machine away from the pig and waited for the result to show up on the display. When the number appeared, she looked back up at the pig “Your blood alcohol concentration is currently 0.11%, Mr. Hoofson.” She ignored the sound of Nick’s teeth grinding. “Do you know what the legal limit is in the state of Missouri?”

“Haha! Point twelve, right?” the pig responded with a nervous grin.

“No, it’s actually 0.08. You are in no condition to be driving, Mr. Hoofson,” the bunny cop replied sternly.

“Ohhhh, come on now,” the pig began to protest, “I’m not as think as you drunk I am. I’m only…” He paused as he tried to calculate the difference in his head, but quickly gave up. “…A little bit over. Can’t you let me off with a warning or somethin’?”

When the pig said this, something snapped inside Nick. “ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!” he roared as he grab the pig’s shoulders and pushed him backward until his back was against the car. “DO YOU REALIZE HOW DANGEROUS THIS IS?! YOU COULD HAVE KILLED SOMEONE! AND YOU DARE ASK FOR A WARNING?!”

“WILDE! PATROL CAR! NOW!” Judy screamed at her partner. “I don’t know what your problem is today, but I’ve had enough and I’m not dealing with it right now!”

Nick turned his head to face his partner, a scowl still on his face. “I’m not-”

“NOW!” she roared again, this time pointing with her free hand back at the patrol car.

The two stared at each other for a second before Nick released his hold on the pig, gave a sarcastic salute and a “Yes, ma’am” to Judy, and trudged back to the car.

Judy watched as he walked. When he got closer to the patrol car, she spoke up again. “Passenger seat, Wilde! I’m driving!” Nick growled in frustration, but went around to the other side of the car. Judy turned her attention back to the pig. “Now. As for you Mr. Hoofson…”

#

The drive back to the precinct had been a silent one. Nick had glared back at the now arrested pig a few times, but didn’t say anything. Judy could only begin to imagine what was running through the fox’s mind. What Nick had said WAS true; what the pig had done was incredibly dangerous and potentially lethal, but he had to be more professional than that. They were cops after all. Her confusion regarding her partner’s mental state was only further compounded once they reached the precinct. He had immediately headed up to their office without a word, leaving her to make sure the pig was taken to a holding cell.

After everything had been taken care of with the pig, she headed straight for their office, her anger growing with each step. It was one thing for the fox to keep certain things to himself, but one of those things had now affected their work, and an explanation was needed. Judy was determined to get it.

“Okay, Nicholas Piberius Wilde!” she began as she slammed their office door open and stormed in. “Start talking! What on Earth was-” She stopped suddenly, caught off guard by what she saw. She wasn’t sure what she HAD been expecting her partner to be doing when she got up to the office, but it sure wasn’t this. In front of her was Nick, slumped forward in his chair, his paws covering his face, and sobbing heavily. “Nick?” she asked in a much quieter voice, her anger immediately defused upon seeing him in such a state. He didn’t respond, so she closed the door behind her, walked over to her chair, rolled it over beside his, and sat down in it. “It’s okay, Nick,” she comforted as she patted his arm. “Let it out. Take your time. I’m not going anywhere.”

The fox continued to weep for several minutes before his sobs slowly faded to occasional sniffles. Finally, after a few ragged breaths and a wipe of his eyes, he turned to face his partner. “I think I’ve changed my mind,” he said slowly.

“Changed your mind?” Judy asked, a confused look on her face. “Changed your mind about wha- ooohhh.” She realized what he was talking about as she thought back to their conversation in the car earlier. “Well, in that case, I’m all ears. Pun intended,” she said with a slight smile.

One corner of Nick’s lips came up briefly at her joke, before he let out a heavy sigh. “Oh my gosh, where do I start?” he wondered.

“The beginning usually works best,” Judy responded.

Nick considered this for a few seconds before continuing. “Okay, you’re right. The beginning. So let me begin by asking you this. Where do you think I was born, Judy?”

Judy gave him a look. “I didn’t mean the LITERAL beginning,” she began to protest.

“No, no, I’m serious,” Nick cut her off. “Where do you think I was born?”

Judy, a little confused, responded. “Well, Zootopia, of course.”

Nick shook his head. “Not quite.”

“Well, somewhere in Missouri at least,” Judy countered.

Nick shook his head again. “You’re about 1500 miles off.”

This confused the bunny cop even more, and she tilted her head to the side and furrowed her brow in a questioning look. Nick answered her unasked question.

“The University of Washington Medical Center.”

“University of Washington?” Judy repeated. “As in Seacattle, Washington?”

“The one and only. You see, my mother is from Zootopia, but my father was born and raised in Seacattle. He was enlisted in the Air Force for four years before I was born, most of that time spent performing maintenance on B-52s. He was sent to Foxchild after his training and it was during that time that he met and married my mom. He also got his civilian airframe and powerplant maintenance certifications around that time, so when he got out of the Air Force, he and my mom moved back to Seacattle, where he got a job fixing jets for one of the airlines at SeaTac. About a year after the move, I was born.”

“How long did you live in Seacattle?” Judy asked.

“Seven years,” Nick answered. “I loved it there. Every so often Mom would take me to the Ballamb Locks to look at the boats or down to SeaTac or Doeing Field [prounounced “doe,” as in a female deer or rabbit, and then “ing”] to watch the planes take off and land. And whenever he could afford it, which to be honest wasn’t all that often, Dad would take us to the King Cheetah Dome to catch a Mariners or Seahawks game. That’s where I got that flag up there,” Nick pointed at the Mariners flag pinned to the wall above his desk. “Dad bought it for me at an M’s game one summer. Man, he loved those teams. If he wasn’t at the stadium, he would make every effort to watch their games on TV.” Nick paused and looked off in the distance as he got lost in some memories.

“How did you end up in Zootopia?” Judy prodded gently after a short pause.

Nick looked back at Judy with a sad look on his face. His eyes began to water again. He sighed heavily before continuing slowly. “When I got off the school bus one afternoon, I was met by one of our neighbors instead of my mom like usual. When I asked her where my mom was, all she would say was that my mom couldn’t make it today so she had asked her to come get me.” Nick’s voice began to break a little “When I walked in the front door, I-I found my mom sitting at the kitchen table crying. There was a cop s-sitting next to her. Of course, I ask what’s wrong, but M-mom was too distraught to say anything. So the cop turns to me and says,” Nick paused as he struggled to maintain control of his voice. “He says, ‘Son, your father is dead.’” A few sobs followed before he continued. “He was killed by a drunk driver on his way back to work from his lunch break. That was 26 years ago… today.” At this point, Nick lost all control and began to sob again.

“Oh, Nick,” Judy said sympathetically. As the fox continued to sob, she stood in her chair, climbed over his armrest, and stood on his lap as she comforted him with a hug.

Nick returned the hug, gripping his partner tightly. “That idiot!” he bawled. “He killed him! That stupid idiot had no business being behind the wheel, and he killed him! My dad is dead because of him!”

“I know, Nick. I know,” Judy comforted as she began to tear up a little too. “Let it out. It’s okay. Let it out.” The two sat there, letting the tears fall for a few minutes before they began to regain control again.

Nick let out another shuddering sigh before continuing again. “After he died, my mother had trouble finding work, and decided it best that we move to Zootopia so she could be close to her family who could help us out while she tried to find work. They helped her find the job at the tailor’s shop over in Sahara Square. She still works there today.”

Judy finally released the hug, but still held Nick’s hands in her own as she sat down on the edge of his desk, her feet resting on his legs. “I’d like to meet her someday,” she said quietly, as she looked into his eyes.

Nick nodded slightly. “And now you know why I blew up today. I really thought I had put it past me. I haven’t gotten this emotional about it since the Seahawks won the Supurr Bowl a few years ago, but I guess the DUI stop triggered something in a similar way.” He sighed and looked down at his lap. “I’m really sorry about dumping all of this on you, Judy. I feel like I’ve been burdening you with so much emotional stress lately and I hate it.”

“Hey, look at me,” Judy immediately commanded. Nick looked up. “You are NOT a burden. Okay? Don’t ever think that. You are my FRIEND. I care about you and I want you to tell me if something’s bothering you. I know you would be there for me if *I* needed it.”

Nick smiled. “Thanks, Fluff.”

Judy smiled back at him before reaching over and picking up the Seacattle Seahawks Supurr Bowl XLVIII Champions ball cap that Nick had sitting on his desk. She examined it for a moment before looking back up at Nick. “May I?”

“Sure.”

She put the hat on her head and took a moment to adjust it before turning back to her partner. “What do you think?”

“I think Dad would have loved it,” he said with a warm smile.

“What?” she asked. “Me wearing the hat or just the hat?”

“Both.”

Judy chuckled as she removed the hat and held it in one paw while she ran the fingers of her other paw over the Seahawks logo. Neither one of them said anything for a few minutes, until Judy looked back up at Nick again. “I’m glad you told me about your dad, Nick. I know it’s not easy for you to talk about things like that. And I’m sorry about what happened to him, but you know… there is at least one good thing to come out of it.”

“What’s that?” he asked.

Judy looked down at the hat briefly before tossing it onto the desk beside her. She looked back up at the fox. “It put you in my life. Something I thank God every day for.”

Nick smiled. “You’re gonna make me cry again.”

Judy chuckled. “Come on. Let’s go home.” And with that, the two stood and headed for the door.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! I gotta be honest, I’m a little nervous about the quality of the ending, but I couldn’t really think of a way to improve it, so let me know what you think. Until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	7. For Once You Have Tasted Flight

For Once You Have Tasted Flight

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! See? I haven’t forgotten about or stopped working on this! I’m still here! As always, thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

This story takes place roughly six months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy.

Zootopia, Piper Aircraft, Deadliest Catch, Arrowhead Stadium, Kauffman Stadium, and the Federal Aviation Administration belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Here is the seventh installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: For Once You Have Tasted Flight!

#

“Pete, are you sure about this? Is it safe?” Nick asked nervously. A few feet in front of him was a propeller spinning at over 2000 revolutions per minute, below him was more than 5000 feet of open sky, and in the left seat next to him was the bunny pilot that had just offered him the opportunity to actually FLY an airplane. He wasn’t sure if this was a dream or a nightmare.

“What’s the matter, Slick?” Pete asked with a smile. “Don’t you trust me?”

Nick looked over at him with a nervous expression on his face.

“It’s perfectly safe, Nick,” Judy said encouragingly as she leaned forward from the backseat of the four-seater Pupper Cherokit. “Pete’s let me fly under his supervision plenty of times. It’s really easy once you get the hang of it!”

Nick looked back at Judy briefly, considering her words. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust them. On the contrary, these were the two people he trusted most in this world. But they were talking about letting him FLY AN AIRPLANE. Nick faced forward again and looked down at the yoke that seemed to be teasing him, and considered the events that had led up to this moment.

#

It was earlier that week, Wednesday evening to be precise. Pete, Nick, and Judy were sitting around Nick’s kitchen table having dinner, with Nick and Judy on either end of the table and Pete on one side. Pete had just gotten back from aircraft commander school earlier that day and Nick and Judy had prepared a welcome home dinner for him. The three of them were enjoying their meal and since Pete had just returned from AC school, his experiences there dominated the conversation.

“Probably the hardest part was all the new crew resource management stuff,” Pete was explaining in answer to a question from his sister. “But actually flying the jet? That was a piece of cake. The only challenge with that was getting used to reaching for the throttles with my right paw instead of my left. When we actually went up and flew a training sortie, it was like a three-hour break. There’s nothing quite as relaxing as flying. The sense of freedom it gives you is just…” he paused, trying to think of the right words. “It’s just indescribable,” he finished, a slight smile crossing his face.

“Have you always felt that way about flying?” Nick asked.

“Ever since I got my first ride,” Pete replied. “I remember it like it was yesterday. I was five years old and Dad had hired this retired F-4 pilot who ran a crop-dusting business to spray a few of our crops. What was his name, Jude?”

“Mr. Robin Oats. Great guy,” Judy answered.

“Mr. Oats. That’s right,” Pete said, remembering. “Well, every time he came to our farm to spray, I would run out on the back porch where you get a good view of the rest of the farm and watch him fly back and forth, low over the crops. Any chance I got, I would ride my bike down to his hangar at Bunnyburrow Regional and pepper him with questions. Mom and Dad always worried that I was annoying him, but he always seemed happy to talk flying with me or anyone else. In addition to his crop-dusting business, he also owned a Pupper J-3 Cub for his own private use and, a few months after Dad hired him, he offered to take me up one Saturday. We only did a few circuits around the pattern, but that was all it took. I was hooked. I knew from that moment on, I wanted to spend my life flying.”

“He sounds like a nice guy,” Nick observed. “I wish I had had an opportunity like that growing up.”

“Yeah, sitting in the back of an airliner isn’t quite the same,” Pete agreed.

“It’d be better than nothing though,” Nick responded.

Pete was about to say something else, but paused when he realized the implications of what Nick had said. However, Judy was the first to speak up again.

“Wait, hang on,” she began, “Nick, you HAVE flown commercial before, right?”

“Nope. I’ve never flown period. Commercial or otherwise.”

“You’re 33 years old and you’ve never been up in a plane before?!” Pete asked in shock. “How is that possible? Your dad worked for the airlines!”

“As a maintainer,” Nick reminded the bunny airman. “Only the aircrews and corporate folks got discounts on flights. We weren’t poor by any means, but dad wasn’t raking in the dough either.”

“But what about when you moved from Seacattle to Zootopia?” Judy asked, just as shocked.

“Mom thought we’d save money by driving our car instead of shipping it with the rest of our stuff,” Nick responded with a shrug.

“Oh sweet cheese and crackers, Slick,” Pete exclaimed as he leaned back in his chair. “You don’t know what you’ve been missing!”

“Hey, I’m not saying I don’t want to do it,” Nick replied a little defensively. “On the contrary. I’d love to do it, but like I said, I’ve never had the opportunity. I’m sure I’ll get a chance one of these days, but until then…”

Pete stared at the fox for a moment, as if he was considering some options. After a few moments, a grin slowly began to spread across his face.

“What?” Nick asked.

“Excuse me a moment,” Pete said as he stood from the table. “I have a phone call to make,” he finished as he walked over to the landline sitting on the kitchen counter.

Nick looked over at Judy with a puzzled look. She merely shrugged. In the meantime, Pete had dialed and had the phone up to his ear.

“Hey, Eddie! It’s Pete Hopps,” he began once the phone had been answered. A short pause. “I’m fine, just got back into town today.” Another pause. “Yeah, it’s good to be home. Hey, listen, I was wondering if any of the Cherokits were available sometime Saturday afternoon?” Another pause. “Eight Zero Whiskey at thirteen thirty? Yeah, that’ll work. Put me down for an hour and a half.” Brief pause. “No, it’ll be local; just out to the practice area and back.” Pause. “Okay, thanks Eddie! See you Saturday! You too. Bye.” Pete hung up the phone and walked back to the table with a wide grin on his face.

“You just got your opportunity, Slick,” Pete said as he sat down

“Huh?”

“I just called the FBO [fixed base operator; it’s a type of business at airports that sells fuel, rents airplanes, provides flight instruction, etc.] over at Sahara Square Airport and reserved an airplane for this Saturday at 1:30. I’m gonna take you flying.”

“Hey, that’s a great idea!” Judy exclaimed. “You’ll love it, Nicky! I always have a blast whenever Pete takes me up.”

“And you’re coming too,” Pete added, turning to his sister. “It’s been far too long since you went up with me.”

“Yeah, I guess the last time was when I came to visit you in Shrewport a few years ago, wasn’t it?” Judy pondered.

Nick grinned as his roommate and best friend began reminiscing about their flying experiences together. This Saturday, he was going to get to do something he had wanted to do since he was a kit. He was really, really lucky to have these two bunnies in his life.

#

Later that night, after Judy had gone home to her apartment and Pete and Nick were sitting in front of the TV watching a Deadliest Catch rerun, Nick got to thinking about the flight that weekend. Did he need to do anything to prepare? Would he have any problems once in the air? Would he get airsick? Boy, that would be embarrassing in front of his tough-as-nails partner. And her brother. But mostly her. Oh, great. Now he was getting nervous. He turned to the bunny pilot. “Hey Pistol?”

“Yeah?” he responded not looking away from the TV.

“The first time you went flying, were you… nervous at all?” the fox asked hesitantly.

Pete turned to look at his roommate. “Mmm, not that I can remember. Of course, I was five years old at the time so I probably didn’t know any better. Why? Are you?”

“Well….. sort of,” he began. “I mean, I’m not worried about flying in and of itself, I’m just…” he paused, trying to think of the best way to ask this. Finally, he decided on, “Have you ever gotten airsick?”

“Ah,” Pete nodded with an understanding smile. “As a matter of fact, I have.”

Nick cocked his head to one side in mild surprise. “You’re kidding. You?”

“Yep,” Pete affirmed. “Once, during a low-level mission when I was first getting qualified on the ’52. And you know what my instructor had to say about it in the debrief?”

“What?”

“He said, ‘Lieutenant Hopps, there are two kinds of people in this world: those who have, and those who will.’ There’s no shame in it, Slick. God did not originally design man for flight. We’ve only been doing it for a little over a hundred years. Things like this are bound to happen. Even to the best of us.”

Nick considered this for a moment. “What about Carrots?” he asked. “Has she ever gotten airsick?”

Pete squinted for a moment, trying to think. “No, not that I can recall.” Then the bunny smirked. “Why? You trying to prove something to her?”

Both males chuckled, but inside, Nick knew the rabbit wasn’t too far off.

#  
It was now Saturday morning. As Pete walked into the kitchen to fix breakfast, he stopped at the landline phone sitting on the counter, set it to speaker phone, and dialed a number before heading over to the refrigerator. After a short ring, an automated voice came through the speaker. “Zootopia Sahara Square Airport. Automated Weather Observation. One-three-five-six zulu. Wind-calm. Visibility-one zero. Sky condition-clear. Temperature-three four Celsius. Dew point-zero one Celsius. Altimeter-three zero two eight. Remarks-density altitude one thousand one hundred.”

“Hot dog!” Pete remarked to himself with a smile as he reached over to end the call.

“Checking the weather?” Nick asked as he stepped into the kitchen.

“Yep, it’s looking good,” Pete replied as he carried his bowl of cereal and banana over to the table and sat down. “It’s a little warm, which is to be expected over in Sahara Square, but it’s also clear and a million. You can’t ask for much better flying weather.”

“Clear and a million?” Nick questioned as he turned on the stove and grabbed some ingredients out of the fridge.

“Pilot slang: no clouds and near unlimited visibility,” Pete explained.

“Mmm,” Nick acknowledged as he began pouring pancake batter into a frying pan.

“You getting excited?” Pete asked with a smile.

“I’ve been excited all week!” Nick replied.

“Really? You haven’t been acting like it,” the bunny pilot observed.

Nick cocked his head to the side and gave him an odd look. “Well what did you expect? For me to jump up and down and talk about it nonstop? Or maybe to count down the days until the flight?”

Pete chuckled. “Well, for you, I guess not. But the funny thing is, you just described Jude’s reaction, almost to a T, when I made plans to take her up for the first time.

Nick chuckled. “Yeah, that sounds like her.”

He was about to say something else, but the ringing of the doorbell cut him off.

“I’ll get it,” Pete said as he stood from his seat.

Nick continued cooking, with one ear pealed to hear who was at the door.

“Oh, hey, Jude!” Nick heard his roommate say from the other room. “Come on in! We were just talking about you.”

“All good things, I hope,” Judy replied as the two rabbits walked into the kitchen and sat down.

“Oh sure, sure,” Pete answered. “I was just describing your reaction when I told you I was taking you flying for the first time.”

A look of mild horror came across Judy’s face. “You didn’t.”

“Oh yes,” Pete replied, a mischievous grin on his face. “I was just getting to the part where you forgot to plug in your headset.”

“NO. DON’T,” the bunny begged.

Pete ignored her and turned to Nick. “So I start the engine and turn the avionics [just a fancy word for the electronics on an airplane] on and I ask Jude here if she can hear me on the headset. Of course, I’m expecting a quick ‘loud and clear, how me?’ as I’m finishing the engine start checklist, but I don’t get any response. So after a few seconds, I look over at her, and she’s tapping the left earpiece of her headset and looking up at me with this confused look on her face.”

Judy groaned and lowered her head face first onto the table.

Pete continued. “It’s obvious she can’t hear me, so I start troubleshooting. And I tried everything. I checked to see if there were any loose wires in the headset, we tried turning the noise canceling feature on and off, I tried cycling the avionics, I mean I tried EVERYthing. Except one. About five minutes later, I’m like, okay, this has gone on long enough. So I’m about to shut down the engine so I can walk back into the FBO and ask if they’ve got another headset we can borrow, when out of the corner of my eye, I see this glint of light off something metal. I look down at the floorboard on her side of the cockpit and right there, plain as day, are the two plugs for her headset just laying there. I don’t think I’ve ever seen her so embarrassed.”

Nick chuckled at his partner’s reaction. She looked so cute when she tried to cover her face with her ears like that. He realized he had been using that word a lot (albeit only in his private thoughts) to describe her recently. He made a mental note to give that line of thought a little more consideration at some point, but for right now, he just wanted to enjoy her company.

“Yeah, yeah, laugh it up you two,” Judy muttered. “So I got a little excited and made a silly mistake. So what? It’s not like you’ve been perfect in the plane either,” she continued as she turned to face her brother. “What about the time you threw up on your instructor at the B-52 schoolhouse?”

“You got airsick ON YOUR INSTRUCTOR?!” Nick asked with a disgusted look on his face.

Pete sighed. “I never should have told you that story,” he muttered in his sister’s direction before turning to his roommate. “Yeah, like I said, it was a low-level mission so we had been bounced around pretty good. I made the mistake of not using the restroom before the mission, so by the time we were on our way back to Barksdale, I really had to go. So I used the lav and started climbing the ladder back up to the flight deck. When I reached the top of the ladder, I suddenly felt extremely nauseous. I scrambled for the airsickness bag I had left on my seat, but I didn’t quite make it and, well… my IP [instructor pilot] ended up with semi-digested carrot soup down the back of his flight suit.”

“That’s disgusting!” Nick exclaimed as he carried his plate of now finished pancakes over to the kitchen table.

“Military aviation isn’t always as glamorous as it’s made out to be,” the bunny pilot explained with a shrug. Just then, his cell phone began to buzz on the table. “Excuse me,” he said as he picked it up and headed into the other room.

“Well now I don’t know if I want to eat this!” Nick remarked to his partner, still disgusted by Pete’s story.

“What is it?” Judy asked.

“Blueberry pancakes. One of my mother’s recipes,” the fox explained as he poured some syrup over the top. “Want some?”

“Sure.”

The fox stuck his fork into one of the pancakes and cut off a small slice before holding it up to the bunny who leaned forward and pulled it off with her mouth.

“Mmm!” she moaned as she chewed. “That’s really… good….” She trailed off as she realized what she had just done.

The two stared at each other for a moment before Nick found his voice again. “Um, I-I’m glad you like it. I can give you the recipe if you want.”

“Yeah, that would be great!” Judy quickly agreed.

“Yeah.”

“Yeah.”

#

“That’s what we’re flying?!” Nick asked as the three of them walked across the scorching ramp to the plane. “Who’d they buy this plane from?! Orville or Wilbur?!”

In front of the trio sat a 1967 Pupper Cherokit 140. A low wing, single engine bird with tricycle landing gear, worn paint, and – as Nick found out when he stepped up on the right wing and poked his head inside the only door – a rather odd odor that he couldn’t quite place. To Nick’s untrained eye, it looked anything but airworthy. [If you want to see a picture of the airplane instead of relying on my poor description, just Google images of Piper Cherokees.]

Pete chuckled, “Oh, come now, Slick. It’s not that old. The jets I fly for a living are older than this.”

“Are you sure it’s safe?” the fox asked as he turned to face the two bunnies who were now standing on the ramp just behind the wing.

“Well, let’s find out,” Pete replied. “Reach into the seatback of the right front seat and grab that binder for me, will ya?”

Nick did as he was told and handed the binder to the bunny pilot who laid it on the wing and flipped it open. The fox jumped down off the wing and stood behind Pete, looking over his shoulder.

“So, this page here lists the details of the last annual inspection of the airplane, which was accomplished last December, so it’s good for a few more months,” Pete began to explain to his roommate on his left and his sister on his right. “You can see here the engine was due for an overhaul, so the engine in the plane now is practically brand new.” Pete flipped a couple pages over and continued his explanation. “And because this plane is used for flight instruction, FAA regs mandate it be inspected every 50 and 100 hours of flight time. You can see here the 50 hour was done 12 hours ago.”

“That’s all great,” Nick interjected, still a little wary. “But don’t you have to do some sort of inspection of the plane yourself before you fly?”

“Yep,” Pete replied, flipping back to the front of the binder and pulling a spiral bound laminated booklet from the front pocket. “And you’re going to help me do it. Here’s the checklist,” he continued, handing it to the fox. “Just read each item to me as we do the walk-around. Jude, if you could undo the tie-downs, that would be great.”

While the two males began the walk-around just behind the right wing, Judy untied the ropes securing the two wings and the tail to the black flight line pavement. This took significantly less time than the walk-around, so she met back up with her brother and partner as the two of them worked their way around the tail and back up the left side of the rear fuselage [the body of the airplane]. The bunny cop smiled at how her brother would explain to Nick exactly what he was looking at for each checklist item and how Nick would nod every so often, trying to soak everything in. She silently reached into her pocket and pulled out her phone, taking a few pictures of the two most important men in her life bonding over an airplane.

#

When they had finished the walk-around, the three of them came back around to the rear of the right wing root [wing root is simply where the wing meets the fuselage of the plane] and prepared to climb into the plane. Nick, assuming that he would be sitting in the rear, began to climb up onto the wing ahead of the two bunnies.

“Hey, Slick,” Pete began, “Why don’t you let Jude go up first so she can crawl in the back.”

The fox turned to look at his roommate. “Can’t she just crawl in behind me? I’ll sit on the left and she’ll sit on the right.”

“I can’t have you both sitting back there,” Pete replied. “That would put the CG [center of gravity] well aft of the aft limit.”

Nick looked at the bunny pilot for a moment, processing what he was saying before finally realizing, “Are you saying….” He trailed off. “Are you saying you want me to sit up front?”

“Well, yes,” Pete replied, a little confused. “What did you expect? You’re the reason we’re doing this.”

“I know that, but I don’t know how to fly!” the fox countered. “What if I accidently hit one of the controls or something?”

Judy chuckled. “Relax Nicky. I’ve sat in the front seat every time I’ve flown with Pete. It’s not that big a deal. You’re not gonna break anything.”

“But I don’t know if-” He was cut off when the bunny cop climbed up on the wing.

“Don’t sweat it, sweetheart,” the bunny smiled at him. “Just do what you’re told and you’ll be fine,” she finished as she patted his cheek before ducking down to crawl through the door and settle onto the rear bench seat.

Nick, a little dumbstruck, slowly brought his paw up to where she had touched his cheek. He stood like that for a few seconds, staring off into space, before he realized that Pete was waiting on him. He turned to look down at the bunny pilot, who was squinting up at him, as if he was considering something. Nick chuckled nervously and shrugged before stepping to one side and gesturing for Pete to enter the plane in front of him. When the rabbit had settled into the left seat, Nick shook his head to rid his mind of some rather distracting thoughts before climbing in after him.

#

“CLEAR PROP!” Pete called through the small window on the left side of the cockpit before pushing the starter button with his left thumb and massaging the throttle with his right paw.

POW! POW! POW! POW! POW! VRRRRRRR! The engine finally caught with a roar and the RPMs leapt up slightly before Pete stabilized the throttle at idle. The bunny pilot then moved his left paw one knob to the right and flipped on the avionics master switch.

Nick heard an electric crackling in his cloth, formfitting headset [I imagine headsets in the world of Zootopia to be similar to the leather flying helmets used in the early days of aviation, and designed for particular species so that they can be formfitting to the ears and allow the ears freedom of movement] immediately followed by Pete’s voice. “Test, test, one, two, how do you hear, Slick?”

“Loud and clear,” the fox responded from the right front seat. “How me?”

“I gotcha loud and clear,” the bunny pilot responded before looking back over his right shoulder. “You got us back there, Jude?”

“I gotcha both loud and clear,” she responded. “How me?”

“Loud and clear,” Pete responded before Nick replied the same.

Once this had been accomplished, Pete turned to the fox next to him and handed him a slip of paper. “Okay, Slick, I’ve got a little job for you. When I tell you to, I want you to hold down this button here on your yoke [looks sort of like a steering wheel, and makes the nose of the plane point up or down and roll left or right] and read this,” he explained as he pointed to the radio push-to-talk button and then to the words he had written on the paper.

This took Nick by surprise and he was about to protest, but before he could do so, Pete pushed one of the buttons on the panel (he assumed it had something to do with the radios) and an automated voice like the one he had heard on the speakerphone in his kitchen this morning filled his ears.

While Pete was copying something down on his kneeboard, Nick turned in his seat to look back at Judy. She saw the questioning look on his face and mouthed, ‘What?’

‘What is this?’ he mouthed back while pointing at the piece of paper.

She looked at it for a moment before smiling and looking back at him. ‘Don’t worry. Just read it.’

Nick would have questioned her further, but at this moment, the voice in his ears fell silent and he turned back in his seat to see Pete pushing the radio push-to-talk button on his own yoke.

“Sahara Square Ground, Cherokit Niner Niner Eight Zero Whiskey,” the bunny pilot transmitted.

A new voice filled Nick’s headset. “Cherokit Niner Niner Eight Zero Whiskey, Sahara Square Ground, go ahead.”

Pete turned to the fox with a smile. “Go ahead, Slick.”

Nick gulped, but reached forward with a trembling paw and keyed the mike. “Sahara Square Ground, Cherokit Niner Niner Eight Zero Whiskey, with you at Signature, going to the southeast practice area at five thousand five hundred, with information Yankee.”

“Cherokit Niner Niner Eight Zero Whiskey, roger, after takeoff fly runway heading, maintain at or below two thousand five hundred, expect vectors to practice area on departure, advise when ready to taxi.”

Pete keyed his mike. “On takeoff fly runway heading at or below two thousand five hundred, expect vectors on departure, and Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey is ready to taxi.”

“Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, roger, taxi one nine via Golf, cross runway two one.”

“Taxi one nine via golf, cross runway two one, Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey,” the bunny pilot finished. He turned to the fox. “Sorry to surprise you like that Slick, but I didn’t think you would do it if I asked you beforehand. What did you think? You just made your first aviation radio call.”

Nick considered it for a moment. “Actually…. that was pretty cool,” he finally said with a slight smile.

“Thought you might like it,” the bunny airman replied with a smile.

#

“Cleared for takeoff, runway one nine, Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey,” Pete transmitted before pushing the throttle in slightly and taxiing onto the runway centerline, where he stopped and turned to the fox in the right seat. “You ready to fly?”

“I was born ready,” Nick grinned back.

“Then let’s go fly,” Pete grinned as he pushed the throttle in all the way to the forward stop. The engine roared at full song and the Cherokit began to accelerate down the runway. “Airspeed’s alive…” the bunny muttered to himself. “60 miles an hour-rotate.”

With just a slight pull on the yoke, the plane slipped the surly bonds of Earth and leapt into the air. Nick stared out the window as the sands of Sahara Square dropped away beneath them. He couldn’t believe what he was seeing. They were flying! They were actually flying!

Judy noticed the giddy expression on the fox’s face and grinned. “Pretty cool, huh Nicky?”

The fox turned to look at his partner, “It’s incredible!”

“You ain’t seen nothin’ yet,” Pete remarked before turning his attention back to the radio.

#

After leveling off at 5500 feet, Pete guided the Cherokit southeast for about five minutes to get them well inside the lateral boundaries of the practice area. Once there, he turned to Nick. “This airplane’s not rated for aerobatics, so we can’t do anything real crazy, but there are a few maneuvers I can show you.”

“I’d love to see anything you’ve got,” the fox responded.

Over the next several minutes, Pete performed a series of maneuvers including climbs, descents, climbing and descending turns, steep turns up to 60 degrees of bank, slow flight at barely five miles an hour above the aircraft’s stall speed [the speed at which the wings no longer produce sufficient lift to keep the aircraft airborne] , and turns around a point among others.

After rolling out of a left hand steep turn, Pete turned to the fox again. “So what do you think? Is flying everything you hoped it would be?”

“And more!” Nick replied excitedly. “It’s amazing how masterfully you’re able to make the airplane do exactly what you want it to do.”

“Oh, it’s not that hard once you get the hang of it,” Pete replied. “You wanna have a go at it?”

“Wait, what?”

“You wanna fly for a little bit?” Pete elaborated. “It’s really simple. We can start with straight and level. The throttle’s already set for straight and level flight, so all you have to worry about is keeping the wings level and maintaining altitude with the yoke. Push forward on the yoke to make the nose go down and start a descent, pull on it to make the nose go up and start a climb, and turn it left or right to roll in that direction. To check that you’re maintaining straight and level, you’re primarily going to reference these two instruments, your attitude indicator and your altimeter,” the bunny explained, pointing to the two round dials on the panel in front of them. “This yellow horizontal bar on the attitude indicator represents the wings of the airplane. When one of the wings dips below this white horizon line between the upper blue half and the lower black half of the instrument, simply roll the aircraft smoothly in the opposite direction to correct. Your altimeter gives you your altitude above sea level. On the altimeter, we have three ‘hands’ like a clock, but you only need to worry about two of them. This smaller hand indicates our altitude in thousands of feet, and this larger hand points to hundreds of feet. So because the smaller hand is between the five and the six, and the larger hand is pointing at the five, our altitude right now is five thousand five hundred feet. Make sense?”

“Uhhhh….”

“Okay, these two hands are the only ones-” Pete began to explain again, but Nick cut him off.

“No, no, no, it makes sense, but…” he trailed off.

“What?” the bunny pilot asked.

“Pete, are you sure about this? Is it safe?” Nick asked nervously.

“What’s the matter, Slick?” Pete asked with a smile. “Don’t you trust me?”

Nick looked over at him with a nervous expression on his face.

“It’s perfectly safe, Nick,” Judy said encouragingly as she leaned forward from the backseat. “Pete’s let me fly under his supervision plenty of times. It’s really easy once you get the hang of it!”

Nick looked back at Judy briefly, considering her words. It wasn’t that he didn’t trust them. On the contrary, these were the two people he trusted most in this world. But they were talking about letting him FLY AN AIRPLANE. Nick faced forward again and looked down at the yoke that seemed to be teasing him.

“In all seriousness, Nick, it’s perfectly safe,” Pete reassured the fox. “I’m right here and I’ll be shadowing you on the controls. Just make your movements smooth and you’ll be fine.”

Nick took a deep breath. Then let it out. “Okay,” he finally said. The fox slowly reached forward and took hold of the yoke and extended his feet so they were resting on the rudder pedals.

“Okay. You have the airplane,” Pete replied as he released the yoke, but kept his paw hovering an inch away.

Nick death gripped the yoke with both paws, excited but scared at the same time. The plane began a slight climb, and Nick quickly pushed the yoke way too far forward in an effort to correct it.

“Easy, easy,” Pete admonished, his hovering paw preventing the fox from pushing the yoke too far and sending the plane into a dive. “Smooth, gentle corrections. It’s not a big deal if you’re off by fifty feet. The plane’s pretty much trimmed out, so you shouldn’t need to move the yoke more than a half inch or so in any direction.”

“Okay, got it,” Nick affirmed as they returned to five thousand five hundred and Pete released the yoke again.

“Also, don’t try to strangle the yoke,” the bunny pilot continued. “If you grip it like that, it’s almost a guarantee you’ll manhandle it and you’ll be all over the place. Try holding it with just a few fingers on one paw.”

Nick slowly let go of the yoke with his left paw, and then loosened his grip with his right. The plane started to bank to the left slightly, and the fox corrected. But this time, it was a gentle tug with his right paw, turning the yoke a few degrees to the right. The plane righted itself momentarily before beginning a slight descent. Nick eased the yoke towards himself about a quarter of an inch, and the plane returned to the desired altitude. A grin began to spread across the fox’s face as the process continued, the oscillations becoming smaller and smaller until he practically wasn’t making any control inputs at all. “Ha! Ha ha ha!” he began to chuckle uncontrollably. “I’m flying! Look, Judy, I’m flying!”

Judy giggled at her friend’s excitement. “I can see, Nick!” Judy grinned. “You’re doing great!”

Pete grinned at the fox. There weren’t too many things in the world that were more gratifying to the bunny than opening someone’s eyes to the joys of flight. “I’m impressed, Slick. You want to try turning now?”

“Sure!”

“Okay. To turn, we have to reference the attitude indicator again as well as the turn coordinator,” the bunny began to explain, pointing to the two instruments. “You see this little triangle at the top of the attitude indicator?”

“Yeah.”

“And you see these two hash marks about a third of the way down on either side from the top of the instrument?”

“Yeah.”

“Those are the 30 degree hashmarks,” Pete continued. “When you bank the airplane so that the triangle is pointing at one of them, the airplane is banked thirty degrees in that direction. This is the desired bank angle to give us a standard rate turn.”

“Makes sense,” Nick affirmed.

“Now, if we were to only bank the aircraft in one direction or another, the aircraft would turn slightly because of the horizontal component of lift generated by the wings being dipped in one direction. However, the aircraft would be in what we call uncoordinated flight and would be unstable. To stay coordinated, we also have to add some rudder in the direction of the turn. We do that with the rudder pedals on the floor.”

“How do we know how hard to push on the pedal?” Nick asked.

“Excellent question. Look at your turn coordinator here,” Pete continued, pointing at the instrument. “You see this horizontal glass tube that’s bent down in the middle and the little white ball inside?” Nick nodded. “That ball is rolling around in the tube under nothing more than the force of gravity. No electronics, no gyros, just gravity. We want the ball to be centered at all times. Now, if we were to bank to the left without stepping on the rudder pedals, the ball would roll to the left side of the tube. To correct, we would step on the left rudder pedal until the ball is centered in the tube again. A good memory aid for this is ‘step on the ball.’”

“Okay, I think I got it,” the fox replied.

“Alright, then give me a standard rate turn to the left,” Pete directed.

Nick slowly turned the yoke to the left and began to press on the left rudder pedal, his eyes darting back and forth between the attitude indicator and the turn coordinator. When he got to thirty degrees of bank, he stopped the roll and held the turn.

“Very good, Slick,” Pete began talking Nick through the maneuver. “Just keep doing that. Maybe a little less left rudder. There you go. Perfect. Cross check your attitude indicator. We want thirty degrees of bank, not twenty. That’s it. Excellent. What altitude are we trying to maintain?”

Nick’s eyes snapped to the altimeter. “Oh. Fifty five hundred,” the fox responded as he gave a slight tug on the yoke to correct.

“There you go,” Pete encouraged as they returned to fifty five hundred feet. “Can’t let the altimeter drop out of your crosscheck. Okay, good work. Go ahead and roll out and give me a standard rate turn to the right.”

While all this was going on, Judy sat in the back seat with her cell phone raised, (in airplane mode of course) taking pictures of the two males interacting. As Nick began to roll into the right turn, Judy lowered her phone and began looking through the pictures she had taken so far. She smiled as she came across one in particular. It was of Nick by himself with a huge smile on his face, probably taken towards the end of Pete’s impromptu lesson on straight and level flight. ‘This one’s a keeper,’ she thought to herself. His goofy grin combined with the formfitting headset made the fox look strangely adorable. Her brow furrowed and the grin fell from her face as she realized what had just run through her head. When had she started thinking about him like that? Nick was a great guy and all, but she had never used that word to describe him before. “Adorable?” she muttered to herself, forgetting that she was on a hot mic.

“You say something Jude?” Pete asked from up front.

Her eyes popped wide open and her ears shot up as she realized what she had just said. She slowly raised her head and looked forward as she tried to recover. “Oh, um, n-nothing,” she stammered. “I was just talking to myself. Um, you’re doing a really good job, Nick. Are you sure you’ve never flown before?” she asked, trying to change the subject.

“Flattery will get you nowhere, Fluff,” the fox said with a smirk.

“Hey. It never hurts to try,” the bunny cop countered with a smile, silently thanking God for getting her out of that one.

“Okay, go ahead and roll out here, Slick,” Pete instructed. “Go ahead and keep flying straight and level for a minute.” At this point, Pete keyed the radio push-to-talk button on his yoke. “Zootopia Approach, Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, request with Sahara Square information Alpha.”

A voice came back through the headsets. “Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, Zootopia Approach, say request.”

“Zootopia Approach, Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey request vectors for the Zootopia Bravo VFR corridor,” Pete replied.

“Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, roger, turn left heading two-seven-zero, descend and maintain four thousand five hundred. You are cleared to enter the Zootopia Class Bravo airspace. How will transition of the corridor terminate?” the controller asked.

“Left heading two-seven-zero, descend maintain four thousand five hundred, cleared into the airspace and Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey intends to exit the corridor at the east entrance for a full stop at Sahara Square,” Pete read back the clearance.

“Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, roger.”

“Okay, Slick, I have the airplane,” Pete declared as he took hold of the yoke in his left paw and the throttle in his right and began a descending turn to the left. “I’ll give it back to you in a minute.”

“Okay,” Nick let go of the yoke. “Where are we going?” he asked once they rolled out and he noticed they weren’t aimed at the airport. “Isn’t that the airport back that way?” he pointed off to their right at Sahara Square Airport.

“Yes, it is, but we’re going to take the scenic route back home,” Pete replied. “Seeing Zootopia from the air is an incredible sight to behold.”

“Oh, cool!” Judy exclaimed. “Do you think we’ll be able to see Precinct 1?”

“Precinct 1 is just the tip of the iceberg, Jude,” Pete replied with a smile.

“Hey, Pistol, is that Foxchild up ahead?” Nick pointed.

Pete looked in the direction the fox was pointing. “Yeah, it is. How could you tell?”

“Well, that sort of looks like a B-52 taking off,” Nick pointed again.

“Yeah, you’re right,” Pete confirmed. “That’s probably the crew the 69th is sending out to Red Flag.”

“Red Flag?” Nick questioned.

“It’s a three week exercise the Air Force holds a few times a year at Nellis AFB near Las Haygas,” Pete replied. “They’re talking to Foxchild Tower at the moment, but if we listen, we should hear them come up on Approach pretty quick.”

Just then, a new voice came through the background radio chatter. “Zootopia Approach, RAIN ONE-TWO, passing through one thousand eight hundred.”

“RAIN ONE-TWO, radar contact three miles south of Foxchild, proceed as filed,” the controllers voice replied.

“RAIN ONE-TWO, proceed as filed.”

Pete smiled before keying his mic. “RAIN ONE-TWO, Cherokit Niner Niner Eight Zero Whiskey, kiai o ka lewa.”

Without a moment’s hesitation, the bomber crew replied, “Kiai o ka lewa. Fly safe, Pistol.”

“You too, Bolt,” Pete replied.

“What was that?” Nick asked, a little excited. “It sounded Hawaiian.”

“It is Hawaiian,” Pete replied. “Kiai o ka lewa: guardians of the upper realms. It’s the 5th Bomb Wing motto.”

“That’s so cool!” Nick geeked out when Pete confirmed the Hawaiian origin. “But why’s your motto in Hawaiian? Don’t most military units use Latin?”

“Many do,” Pete began. “But Hawaiian better fits our heritage. Our predecessor unit, the 5th Bombardment Group, was stationed in Hawaii during the years leading up to and for part of the Second World War. In fact, they saved the city of Hilo on the Big Island from destruction back in ’35 by dropping bombs to divert lava flowing from the erupting Mauna Loa. That’s why the patch for my squadron, the 55th, prominently displays an erupting volcano.”

“Hey, look!” Judy interrupted as Pete began a right turn and headed north over Savanah Central. “There’s Arrowbreed Stadium and Kauffmammal Stadium!”

“Yeah!” Nick replied. “And isn’t that Little Rodentia there just to the east?”

“Yep,” Pete confirmed. “We should be coming up on the Watering Hole pretty quick.”

“There it is!” Nick exclaimed, pointing to the right. “And there’s City Hall!”

“And that’s the precinct!” Judy added.

“Oh, this is so cool, Pistol!” Nick exclaimed again. “You can see everything from up here!”

“Including one building you know very well, Slick,” Pete replied before banking the Cherokit to the right, far enough so that the right wing was pointed at the ground. “What’s that just off the right wingtip?” he asked with a sly smile.

“Hey, that’s our house!” the fox burst with excitement.

“Yep, and if we look the other way,” Pete continued before rolling the plane back to the left past wings level, so that now the left wing was pointed at the ground. “We can see a structure that you’re quite familiar with, Jude.”

“My apartment!” the bunny cop explained.

Pete smiled as he rolled back to wings level and continued north in the general direction of Zootopia International Airport. “I know it’s hard to put into words, Slick, but now do you understand the feelings I was trying to describe at dinner Wednesday evening?”

“I understand perfectly, Pete,” Nick responded in a much calmer voice. “This is just absolutely incredible. You are so lucky to be able to do this for a living.”

“Blessed would be the more accurate term,” Pete replied, “but yes, you’re absolutely right. I couldn’t imagine doing anything else.”

#

“Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey, taxi to Signature via Delta, Golf, cross runway two one, contact ground one two one point niner.”

“Taxi to Signature via Delta, Golf, cross runway two one, one two one point niner, Cherokit Eight Zero Whiskey,” Pete responded to the Sahara Square tower controller as he began the left turn off of Runway 19 at Sahara Square Airport.

“Thank you so much for doing this for me, Pistol,” Nick said. “I had an absolute blast today.”

“Oh, you’re welcome Slick,” Pete replied with a smile. “And thanks for giving me an excuse to fly. I don’t fly these light airplanes as often as I’d like.”

“Pete, I, um, well…” Nick started but paused as he tried to think of how to ask his question. “How… how difficult is it to learn to fly?”

Pete’s smile got wider. “You’ve been bitten by the flying bug, haven’t you?”

Nick sheepishly nodded.

“Nick, I think you can do anything you set your mind to,” Pete answered as he brought the Cherokit to a stop in front of the FBO and shut down the engine. “It’s a little pricey, but it’s worth it.”

“Do you know of any instructors I could talk to?” Nick probed further as the three of them removed their headsets.

“Hmmm, do I know any instructors you could talk to?” Pete pretended to be deep in thought. “Gee, I don’t know, I seem to be drawing a blank. Jude, can you think of any?”

Judy was grinning from ear to ear. “Well, I can only think of one at the moment. I think you might have his card in your wallet.”

“Oh yeah! That’s right! I forgot about him” Pete snapped his fingers and pulled his wallet out of his back pocket. “From what I’ve heard, this guy is really good, Slick. You’ll learn a lot from him.” Pete found the card and handed it to the fox.

“Wait a minute,” the fox muttered after he took a second to realize what he was looking at. “’Peter Mitchell Hopps has been found to be properly qualified to exercise the privileges of Flight Instructor,’” he read from what he now realized was an FAA pilot’s license. “You can legally teach me?” he turned to the bunny airman.

“Indeed I can,” Pete replied with a smile. “In fact, we can walk into the FBO right now, buy a log book for you, and record your first training flight. What we did today counts.”

A wide grin crossed the fox’s muzzle. “Then what are we waiting for? Let’s do it!” he exclaimed as he handed Pete’s license back to him and quickly began unstrapping from his seat.

Judy chuckled at her best friend’s eagerness. She loved seeing him smile. Suddenly, an idea occurred to her. “Hey Pete?” she piped up. “How would you feel about having two students at once?”

Pete looked up from the Cherokit’s logbook that he had started to write in and looked at his sister. “You too, huh?”

She nodded eagerly.

Pete considered it for a moment before replying with, “I think I can handle that.”

“Oh, thanks Pete! You’re the best!” she exclaimed before reaching over the front seatbacks to give her brother a quick hug before following her best friend out of the airplane and onto the flight line pavement. “You hear that, Nicky? You and I are going to be classmates!”

“Really?” the fox asked.

“Yup,” Pete answered his question as he too climbed out of the Cherokit and onto the wing. “Now the only question is, which one of you two is going to be good enough for me to let them fly solo first?” he finished with a smile.

“Oh, that’s no question,” Nick began as he looked from his roommate back to the bunny cop and smiled at her. “I’m gonna solo first. I’ve already got a head start.”

“Oh you’re on!” the bunny cop responded. She couldn’t wait to start learning, with her best friend at her side.

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! Our two cops are embarking on a very exciting and very rewarding process!

I’m not a flight instructor, but I tried to explain the aviation terminology as best I could. I hope you were able to follow it and understand.

In case it wasn’t clear from the story, I imagine that there are two public airports in Zootopia plus Foxchild AFB: one is Zootopia International Airport, a very busy airport in the Meadowlands with Class B airspace (the busiest category of airport airspace) that all the airlines fly into. The other is Sahara Square Airport, a small general aviation (general aviation is defined as all aviation other than commercial airlines and the military) airport in, well, Sahara Square, with Class D airspace. I used Kansas City International Airport and Charles B Wheeler Downtown Airport, both in Kansas City, as inspiration for these two airports.

Until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	8. Anything You Want

Anything You Want

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! I’m still here! I’m still alive and kicking! I’m really sorry it took this long to update. The second half of pilot training almost killed me. But I’ve got my wings now and a little bit of time off before I go to the schoolhouse for my new airplane, so I hope to get a few more of these out before then, and even afterwards I’ll still be working on this, just at a much slower pace. As always, thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

This story takes place roughly nine months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy, in approximately October 2017. I goofed on the timeline for the previous story. It should be eight months after Nick’s graduation, in about September 2017. For those who have analyzed my timeline in detail, you will note that this means that I have the majority of the events of the film taking place in roughly July 2016, with Nick graduating from the academy in January 2017 and Pete first reporting in to Foxchild in about March 2017. This also means that in this timeline I’ve set up, Judy was only in Bunnyburrow for about a week or two between the press conference and her revelation about the Night Howlers, even though the directors have stated it’s a matter of a few months. I didn’t realize this when I first laid this whole thing out, and I don’t feel like changing it.

Zootopia, M*A*S*H, Take Me Home Country Roads, Jeppesen, Embry-Riddle Aeronautical University, and North Carolina State University belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Here is the eighth installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: Anything You Want!

#

Nick was bored out of his mind. He, Judy, and one of their fellow officers, B.J. Grizzoli, were shooting the breeze with Ben at the front desk after getting back from a patrol. Well, Judy and Ben were shooting the breeze, while Nick and B.J. were just kinda hanging out. The bunny cop and the cheetah dispatcher had been going on for the past five or ten minutes about some Gazelle something or other. Nick didn’t know for certain. It was a subject he neither knew nor cared about, so he had tuned out about a minute in. He would tolerate it when Judy played Gazelle in the squad car, but he was more of a classic rock and roll kinda guy. He didn’t know why B.J. was still hanging around, but the only reason Nick hadn’t walked away was because his ride home currently made up one half of the conversation.

“What do you think, B.J.?” Ben turned to the polar bear. “Is Gazelle’s second album her best so far, or her third?”

“Oh, I couldn’t say, Ben,” B.J. responded. “I don’t know the two well enough to give an educated opinion. “I’m more of a country guy myself.”

“Really?!” Judy squealed. “I love country too! Who’s your favorite artist?”

Without hesitation the polar bear replied. “John Denfur,” he said with a smile.

“Oh, he’s great!” the bunny cop agreed before breaking into song. “Almost Heaven,”

“West Virginia,” B.J. continued.

“Blue Ridge Mountains,” Judy sang.

“Shenan-doe-ah River!” Judy and B.J. sang together.

“Hey! I ain’t paying you to be a bunch of canaries!” a gruff voice interrupted the impromptu sing-a-long. The four officers turned to see Chief Bogo and a pig in a police uniform that was similar to, but not quite like, the ZPD’s walk through the front doors of the precinct. “Get back to work!”

Nick flashed his signature grin at the chief. “Ah, good afternoon Chief Bogo, sir. Cordial as ever, I see.”

“Stuff it, Wilde,” the chief responded as he and the pig officer came to a stop in front of the desk. “Why are you still standing there? Didn’t you hear what I just said?!”

Never letting the smirk slip from his face, the fox cop replied, “Well, yes sir I did, but Officers Grizzoli, Hopps, and I have already clocked out for the day and Officer Clawhauser is already at his post, sooo……”

“You think you’re sooooo clever, don’t you Wilde?” the Cape buffalo growled.

“I don’t think, sir. I know.”

“Well, that’s half right. You DON’T think.”

“So, uh, Chief Bogo, who’s your friend?” Judy quickly interjected before things got out of hand between the Cape buffalo and the red fox. Again.

Bogo’s expression softened some. “Well, I’ll be making the formal introduction tomorrow at roll call, but I suppose I can introduce you now. This is Sheriff Lillian Rayboar from the Deerbrooke County Sheriff’s Office. She’s going to be observing us and how we do things for the rest of the week in hopes of learning a few things she can apply back home. Lil, these are a few of my junior officers: Benjamin Clawhauser, B.J. Grizzoli, Judith Hopps, and,” he paused and grimaced before finishing, “Nicholas Wilde.”

“It’s a pleasure to meet you all,” the sheriff said with a smile and shook each officer’s paw in turn. However, when she got to Grizzoli, a quizzical expression replaced her smile. “What’s the B.J. stand for?” she asked.

The polar bear smiled. “Anything you want,” he quipped.

“The smile returned to the sheriff’s face. “I’ll get back to you.”

“Well, as much as we’d like to stay and chat, I need to finish showing the sheriff around. Right this way, Lil,” Chief Bogo gestured toward the vice department before the two of them walked off.

“If I didn’t know better, I’d think the Chief has taken a bit of a shine to the sheriff,” Ben remarked with a smile once the two were out of earshot. “Did you notice how he called her Lil?”

But Judy ignored the dispatcher’s comment. She was staring up at B.J. with a skeptical expression on her face. “What DOES B.J. stand for?” she asked.

The polar bear just smiled again and repeated himself. “Anything you want.”

“Oh, come on, Beej. You can tell us, we’re your friends,” Nick prodded.

“I did,” the polar bear continued to smile.

“What, is it some kind of family secret or something?” Ben asked, now also curious.

“If you like,” B.J. smiled.

“All of a sudden you’re getting very mysterious on us,” Judy observed. “What’s the problem?”

“There’s no problem,” B.J. assured before looking down at his watch. “Oh, look at the time! Peg was expecting me to be home fifteen minutes ago! I’ll see y’all tomorrow,” he finished as he headed for the front doors.

“Hey! You can’t just leave us hanging like this!” Nick called after him. “What does it stand for?!”

“Bye!” the polar bear waved before walking out the door.

The three officers still left at the front desk stood in silence for a few moments, each pondering the situation in their own way.

“Well that was weird,” Ben finally spoke up. “What do you suppose it stands for?”

“I don’t know,” Judy spoke with a determined look on her face, still staring at the front doors of the precinct. “But I intend to find out.”

#

The next morning before roll call, Judy and Nick purposefully found a seat next to B.J. and had begun to needle him for an answer once again.

“That must be some awful name you’re hiding if you won’t even tell your best friends,” Nick probed.

“Oh, you’re such a nudge,” B.J. responded before taking a sip of his coffee.

“It’s ‘noodge,’” Judy replied. “There, we told you something. Now you tell us something.”

“It’s no use. I won’t ‘boodge,’” the polar bear cracked with a smile.

“You’re embarrassed, right?” Nick tried to approach it from another angle. “Yeah, that’s it. All right. I know, I know. Look, I’ll tell you an embarrassing story about myself and that’ll put you at ease, won’t it? Okay. When I was 14, my mother invited a friend of hers from church over for lunch. I had never met the woman before, but we got to talking and at one point she happened to mention that she had a newborn at home. Well, I guess she still had a lot of her baby-weight on her because I remarked without even thinking, ‘Oh, and another one on the way!’ Needless to say, Mom didn’t invite her over again.”

B.J. chuckled at the story, but otherwise remained silent.

“Pretty hot stuff, huh?” Judy pressed. “All right, what does B.J. stand for, huh?”

“Room, tench-hut!”

Before B.J. could reply, Officer Higgins called the room to attention as the chief walked in, thus ending the impromptu interrogation.

#

After roll call, Judy and Nick were hot on the polar bear’s heels as they followed him towards their respective offices.

“Okay, okay. You want to hear a really embarrassing story?” Nick asked. “This is a biggie. Sucked my thumb ‘til I was 26.”

“Stop it. Will you stop it already?” B.J. replied over his shoulder, getting slightly frustrated.

“I gave it up for bed-wetting,” the fox added.

Judy looked up at her partner with a shocked and slightly mortified expression. Nick noticed this and quickly shook his head, letting her know he was just kidding.

B.J. sighed before coming to a sudden stop and whirling around to face the smaller officers. “Grizzoli, B.J., Officer, Zootopia Police Dep-”

“Okay, okay, okay,” Judy cut him off before trying another tactic. “What if we guess it?”

B.J. sighed again. “Fine.”

“Oh, goody, goody,” Nick said as he rubbed his paws together. “Okay. Uh, B.J.. Uh, Belvedere Jehoshaphat.”

“Got it! First try,” B.J. smiled before turning back around and continuing towards his office.

“Don’t lie to us!” Judy exclaimed as they began following the larger officer once more. “I’d call you names if you had any!”

#

That afternoon, the bunny and fox officers caught up with the polar bear as they were heading out for the day.

“Was your mother Spanish?” Judy asked as the three approached the front desk.

“No,” B.J. replied. “Why?”

“That eliminates Benito Juárez,” Nick quipped.

“Look, if you guys really want to know, why don’t you ask Ben here to look at my personnel file?” B.J. offered. “I’m sure that’ll tell you everything you need to know.”

“Oh, right!” Judy exclaimed, getting excited. “Ben, open up his file!”

“But B.J.,” Ben began, “Your file-”

“Would love to stay and chat, but the missus is waiting for me,” B.J. cut him off. “I’ll see you guys tomorrow,” the polar bear bid farewell before walking out the front doors of the precinct.

“Well, Benji, don’t just stand there. What does his file say?” Nick pressed the cheetah dispatcher.

“Sorry guys,” Ben apologized. “It’s what I was trying to explain a second ago. I’m one step ahead of you. I looked at his personnel file earlier this afternoon and all it had for a first name was ‘B.J.’”

“Oh, that little sneak!” Judy exclaimed, getting more and more frustrated. “‘Look at my personnel file.’” She mimicked the polar bear’s voice. “‘That’ll tell you everything you need to know.’ He was just trying to get rid of us!”

“I hate getting hustled by cops,” Nick muttered. “Present company excluded of course,” he added quickly when Judy looked up at him.

“Have you two considered the possibility that it really doesn’t stand for anything?” Ben asked the two smaller officers. “That his parents simply named him ‘B.J.?’”

“Not for a second,” Judy responded as she grabbed Nick’s paw and started pulling him towards the exit.

#

Later that evening, Nick and Judy were sitting on the couch in Nick’s living room while Pete sat in the recliner and quizzed his two student pilots from the Jeppawsen Private Pilot written test prep book. It wasn’t going all that well.

“Okay, Judy. This one’s for you,” Pete began before reading another question. “Detonation occurs in a reciprocating aircraft engine when, A: the spark plugs are fouled or shorted out or the wiring is defective, B: hot spots in the combustion chamber ignite the fuel/air mixture in advance of normal ignition, or C: the unburned charge in the cylinders explodes instead of burning normally?”

“Uh, let’s see, detonation,” the bunny murmured to herself. She thought for a moment before responding. “Is it B?”

“No, it’s C,” Pete replied. “Remember, when you hear detonation, think explosion. The unburned charge in the cylinders EXPLODES instead of burning normally,” the rabbit airman explained before reading the correct answer.

“Oh, okay,” the bunny cop acknowledged quietly.

“Okay, Nick,” Pete turned his attention to the fox. “The uncontrolled firing of the fuel/air charge in advance of normal spark ignition is known as, A: combustion, B: pre-ignition, or C: detonation?”

Nick thought for a moment before responding. “C: detonation?” he answered rather unconvincingly.

“Um, no,” Pete replied as he got more and more confused at how badly the two were doing. “I just said that detonation involves an explosion, remember? The answer is B: pre-ignition.”

“Oh, right, right, okay,” the fox accepted quickly.

“Judy, to properly purge water from the fuel system of an aircraft equipped with fuel tank sumps and a fuel strainer quick drain, it is necessary to drain fuel from the, A: fuel strainer drain, B: lowest point in the fuel system, or C: fuel strainer drain and the fuel tank sumps?” Pete asked.

“Uh, fuel sumps would be…. Um….” Judy thought for a moment. “Uh, could you repeat the question?” she finally asked sheepishly.

“Okay, what’s going on you two?” Pete finally asked as he put the book down on his lap. “You had aircraft systems down pat when we went over it last weekend, and out of the thirty questions I’ve asked you tonight, I think you’ve gotten one right between the two of you. Are y’all feeling okay?”

“We’re sorry, Pete,” Judy apologized. “I think we’re just a little distracted tonight.”

“I can tell,” Pete replied emphatically before softening his tone a little. “What’s going on?”

“Well, you see, there’s this officer at the precinct,” Nick began. “His name’s B.J. Grizzoli. We never really gave his name much thought, until yesterday.”

“Yeah,” Judy added. “A visiting sheriff asked him what ‘B.J.’ stood for when they were introduced.”

“And he gave a rather mysterious answer,” Nick continued. “‘Anything you want.’”

“He won’t tell us what it stands for! And it’s been driving us crazy ever since!” Judy finished. “It’s gotta stand for something!”

There was a few seconds pause as Pete continued to look at the two expectantly. “And….?” he finally prodded.

“Um, that-that’s pretty much it,” Nick responded.

“Are you serious?” Pete asked in a deadpan tone.

“Yeah,” Judy answered quiety.

Pete chuckled. “I swear. You two get wrapped around the axle about the darndest things. However, if it’s that much of a distraction,” he paused a moment before finishing. “I think I might have a solution.”

“Really?” Nick asked.

“Yeah,” Pete answered. “There’s this one guy I went through AFROTC with at Lemming-Riddle. Real sharp guy. One of only two or three cadets in the whole country who was able to go OSI straight out of AFROTC.”

“Hang on, you’re starting to lose me,” Nick interrupted. “OSI?”

“Sorry,” Pete apologized before explaining. “Air Force Office of Special Investigations. It’s sort of like a cross between the CIA and FBI, but they typically only handle Air Force specific cases. And they’re all Air Force officers, but they generally wear civilian business attire instead of uniforms and are referred to as ‘agent’ as opposed to their rank.”

“How does that help us?” Judy asked.

“Well, my understanding is that their ability to track down information is similar to the CIA or FBI, and, most importantly, the guy I know just got stationed here at Foxchild a few months ago. I could swing by his office tomorrow and ask him about this if you’d like,” Pete finished.

“Oh, could you Pete?!” Judy asked excitedly. “That would be great! Thank you so much!”

“Of course,” Pete replied with a smile. “Now, do you think we can get back to aircraft systems? You’ve only got a little over a week until you take the written test.”

“Oh, sure,” Judy agreed, her excitement tampered some, but the grin still wide on her face. “Could you repeat the question?”

#

It was a few days later as Pete walked the few blocks across the base from his squadron over to the OSI building for the second time that week. This time, he hoped to get some answers to a question that, he had to admit, the more he thought about it, was starting to nag a little bit at him too.

The OSI building itself wasn’t anything spectacular. It looked like most of the other buildings on base; beige stucco walls, a brown metal roof, and “OFFICE OF SPECIAL INVESTIGATIONS” in brown lettering on the side. It was also one of the smallest buildings on base, since it only needed to hold the Security Forces airman who stood guard and the handful of agents who worked there.

Pete removed his flight cap as he walked through the front door and was greeted by said Security Forces airman, a young ocelot with two stripes on his ABU [Airman Battle Uniform] sleeve, indicating the rank of Airman First Class. “ID please, sir,” the airman requested. Pete had already pulled his wallet from his flight suit pocket in anticipation of the request. He fished out his CAC [Common Access Card] and handed it to the airman, who scanned it with a pawheld scanner before handing it back to him. “Have a good afternoon, Captain Hopps.”

“You too, Airman O’Malley,” Pete replied, having read the airman’s nametag. He put his CAC and wallet back in his flight suit as he walked the few steps to his friend’s office. “Knock, knock, Jack,” Pete greeted the OSI agent with a smile as he gently rapped on the open office door.

Behind the desk sat a gray-furred rabbit with black stripes, wearing a white dress shirt with the sleeves rolled up, a slightly loosened tie, and slacks. His suit jacket was hanging on the back of the chair. The office was decently organized. There were a few papers scattered about the desk that Jack was currently working on, but everything else was in its place. There was also a small fan on the desk oscillating back and forth. The agent looked up from the computer and grinned when he saw his old college friend. “Hey Pete! Come on in! And get the door, will ya?”

“Ugh, do I have to Jack?” Pete asked as he entered the office. “It’s roasting in here,” he continued as he rolled his flight suit sleeves up. “Why haven’t y’all called CE [Civil Engineering, responsible for maintaining all the facilities on base] yet? Y’all were having this problem when I came over here earlier this week.”

“You know the regs, Pete. We’re discussing sensitive information,” Jack reminded him as he wiped some sweat from his brow. “And we did call CE. A week ago. Half the buildings on base are having this problem. It’s this stupid heat wave in autumn combined with older environmental systems. They said they’ll get to us when they can. In the meantime though….” He trailed off as he pointed at the door.

“Okay, okay,” Pete shut the door before sitting down in the office chair opposite the desk. “I hope you have something definitive so I can get in and out of here quick.”

Jack grimaced. “Well, I guess you could say it’s definitive, but it’s probably not what you were looking to hear.”

“What do you mean?” Pete asked.

“I have looked over every single document with his name on it that I can legally get my paws on, and they all say the same thing: B.J.” Jack explained, frustrated. “I mean, pieces of mail, Selective Service information, college paperwork, I was even able to get one of his federal tax returns from a few years back. Nothing.”

“You’re kidding,” Pete sighed.

“Here, see for yourself,” Jack continued as he turned his computer monitor around so Pete could see it. On the screen was a digital copy of one of B.J.’s Form 1040s. All of the sensitive information was redacted, but the name at the top was there clear as day. Just B.J.

“That creep,” Pete chuckled quietly. “He won’t even tell the federal government.”

“Which means that, legally anyway, his first name must really just be B.J.” Jack reminded the bunny pilot. “It’s possible that there’s a sentimental or familial significance behind the name, but that would take a lot longer to figure out and I just can’t justify devoting that much Air Force resources to a friendly favor.”

“I understand, Jack,” Pete nodded.

“I’m sorry I can’t give you anything more.”

“It’s okay,” Pete sighed as he wiped some sweat from his brow. “I just hope my sister and her partner don’t flip their lids when I tell them. It’s all they’ve been talking about the past few days.”

Jack’s brow furrowed. “Her partner? Is Judy dating?”

“What?” Pete asked, confused for a moment. Then he realized what the bunny agent was thinking. “Oh, no, no, no! Her POLICE partner! I’m sorry, I guess I only mentioned Judy when I first asked you about this whole thing, didn’t I? No, Judy’s still very much single.”

Jack nodded. “And what about you?” he asked after a moment as a grin started to spread across his face. “I noticed you’ve started taking some of the advice I gave you back in Preytona.”

“What are you talking about?” Pete asked suspiciously, not liking where this was heading.

“I saw you on your lunch date at the officer’s club last week with that doe,” Jack grinned. “Captain Warrenson I think was her name. She have you feeling all twitterpated?”

Pete realized what he was talking about, and explained indignantly, “Oh please. For your information, that wasn’t a date. She’s a public affairs officer and she was interviewing me for a mammal interest story for the base paper.”

“Don’t they have enlisted folks to do things like that,” Jack egged on.

“Well, yes, but-” Pete tried as his nose began to twitch.

Jack cut him off as he pointed at the patch just below the pencil pocket on the left sleeve of Pete’s flight suit. “And I see you’re wearing the North Carolina State pencil pocket patch she gave you. Her alma mater I assume?”

The tips of Pete’s ears were now burning, and it wasn’t because of the malfunctioning HVAC system, “So I’m wearing the gift she gave me. Big, fat, hairy deal. She gave me a gift and I don’t want to be rude. Look, Mary and I-”

“Ooooohhhhh, her first name is Mary?” Jack interrupted gleefully, absolutely loving watching his friend squirm. “So you’re on a first name basis with her then? That sounds pretty serious.”

“Mary and I are just friends,” Pete finished his sentence. “We go to the same church. We’re in the same Sunday School class, for crying out loud! Can’t a man and a woman be friends anymore without everyone thinking there’s something more going on?!”

Jack was quiet for a moment. Then he leaned forward, clasped his paws together on the desk, and, still grinning, replied in a much quieter tone than Pete, “You’re denying this pretty aggressively.”

Pete opened his mouth to protest further, but decided this wasn’t a battle worth continuing. Instead, he snorted and shook his head before rising from his seat, ready to get out of the sauna that was Jack’s office. “Jack, I know you have to have a lot of intelligence to do what you do, but sometimes, if I didn’t know better, I’d say you’ve got more stripes than brain cells,” he said with a slight grin. “Thanks for your help, or thanks for trying anyway. I do appreciate you taking the time to look into this,” he continued in an attempt to change the subject.

“Ah, don’t mention it, Pete,” Jack chuckled, letting Pete off the hook as he stood as well to see his friend out. “Happy to help an old friend. I hope you guys are able to figure it out.”

“Yeah, you and me both,” Pete said with a sigh as he pulled his folded up flight cap from the pocket on his right leg. “Say hello to Skye and little Adam for me, will you?”

“Will do. You have a good afternoon Captain Hopps,” Jack bid farewell as he held the front door open for Pete.

“You too Agent Savage.”

#

It was the next day and Judy, Nick, B.J., and one of the wolf officers, John Snarlov, were sitting in the precinct break room having lunch. Well, John and B.J. were having lunch. Nick and Judy were mostly focused on needling B.J. They hadn’t taken Pete’s news last night very well.

“All right, no more guessing,” Judy declared. “I’m going to approach this scientifically. Tell me or I’ll kill you!” she screamed as she leapt out of her seat, across the table, and ended up standing on B.J.’s chest, her fists grabbing his uniform shirt collar.

“Help!” B.J. cried out, steadying his chair after the momentum of the rabbit officer’s collision had sent it rocking backward.

“You lie! That starts with an ‘H’!” Nick pointed an accusatory finger at the polar bear.

“Unless you intend to injure yourselves permanently, I do wish you’d stop that,” Snarlov interjected calmly before taking a sip of his lemonade.

“I want the names and e-mail addresses of everybody who’s ever met you!” Judy demanded as she released B.J.’s collar and walked back across the table to where her lunch and her notebook were sitting.

“Okay, okay!” B.J. agreed, thankful for the (at least momentary) reprieve from the bunny’s wrath.

“I’m sending e-mails to anyone who even SUSPECTS what B.J. stands for,” she continued as she grabbed her notebook and began to flip to a blank page.

“Or cares,” John interjected again in an exasperated tone, having grown weary of this whole situation days ago.

Nick had also pulled out his notebook and was prepared to copy as well. “Who was your assigned instructor at the academy?” he asked.

Without missing a beat, B.J. responded, “T.R. Mouser.”

“Now cut that out!” Judy exclaimed as she put the backs of her paws on her hips while still holding the notebook and carrot pen.

“Wait. There’s more,” B.J. continued, a grin starting to appear on his face. “My favorite comedian: W.C. Furlds. Favorite author: D.H. Rawrence.”

“What about S.J. Pigman?” John offered, catching on to what B.J. was doing.

“Or T.S. Eliot?” B.J. countered.

Nick tossed his notebook and pencil on the table and folded his arms across his chest, beyond frustrated. “D-R-O-P D-E-D,” he spelled out.

B.J. turned to John. “What do you think of e.e. clawmmings?”

“I never liked those little initials,” John smiled.

#

A couple more days had passed and Judy, Ben, and B.J. were hanging around the front desk after another work day.

“We’ve got you now, B.J.” Judy was saying with a grin on her face. “We got answers back to all our e-mails today. Nick’s printing them out now, so in a few minutes everyone in the precinct will know your REAL first name.”

“Everyone in the precinct already knows my real first name,” he replied, matching her grin.

“Sure,” she nodded coolly. “Whatever you have to tell yourself.” She turned to look in the general direction of the path to her and Nick’s office, and saw Nick slowly walking toward them, his face down in a stack of papers. “Nicky! Did you get the e-mails?”

Nick looked up from the stack of papers and quickly walked over to the desk. “Um, yeah, Carrots. I’ve got ‘em right here,” he answered hesitantly.

Judy bounced up and down a couple times, unable to contain her giddiness. “All right. This is it. Now I got ya!” she squealed before turning back to her partner. “What do they say?”

“Well,” Nick sighed, “According to every one we got, Officer Grizzoli has no first name. Just B.J.”

“What?!” Judy exclaimed, her face quickly falling. “Let me see that!” she grabbed the stack of papers and flipped through them. “‘B.J.’ ‘B.J.’ Who would name their kid B.J.?!” she exclaimed in frustration as she looked up at the polar bear.

B.J. chuckled, deciding this had gone on long enough. “My mother, BEA Grizzoli, and my father, JAY Grizzoli. B.J.” he explained, emphasizing each initial at the end.

Judy and Nick turned and looked at each other for several seconds, processing this new information. Slowly, a grin began to appear on each of their faces and Judy began to speak. “Ohhhhhh, sure! Now I get it! Bea and Jay. B.J.” Then the grins were immediately replaced with ones of fury.

“You honestly expect us to buy that cockamamy story?!” Nick exclaimed. “Now what does it stand for?!”

B.J. shrugged and replied once more, “Anything you want.”

“AAAARRRRGGGGHHHH!!!!”

#

Author’s Note: Well, I hope y’all enjoyed it! For those who are fans of the old TV show M*A*S*H, you probably recognize that a majority of the dialogue in this story comes from the season 7 episode, “Lil.” I love the series and I just thought it would be really funny to see Judy and Nick freak out like Hawkeye did in the episode.

Also, for your situational awareness, I will be bumping the rating for this series up to T at some point between now and posting the next story. The next one’s gonna be pretty heavy, as are a few others down the line. Nothing graphic or inappropriate, just really, really deep subjects.

Also, also, I’ve come up with a few more story ideas since I’ve been sitting on this thing for so long, including the next one, so this should ultimately have a few more stories than I originally told y’all to expect in the first installment.

Until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


	9. Not Goodbye, Just See You Later

Not Goodbye, Just See You Later

Author’s Note: Hey everyone! I’m back! I know I say this every time, but I’m really sorry it took this long to update. I hope you can understand how time consuming the responsibilities of an active duty Air Force pilot are. But I’m still enjoying writing this whenever I have the time and I hope you’re still enjoying reading it! As always, thank you to everyone who has favorited, followed, and reviewed this. It means a lot that you took the time to do so!

Before I get into the story itself, I would like to dedicate this installment to the late syndicated conservative columnist Dr. Charles Krauthammer, who passed away while I was writing this installment. He was a good man and I thoroughly enjoyed listening to and reading his commentary not just on politics in America, but on life itself. His “Zoosona” was briefly mentioned way back in the first installment of this series, when Bill O’Rhino introduced his guest Dr. Charles Cat-hammer. He will be missed.

This story takes place roughly nine months after Nick’s graduation from the Academy, and about a week or two after the end of the last story, in mid to late October 2017. Brace yourself, because it deals with some deep subjects and might be a little depressing. I’m hoping to get the next installment out as quickly as I can so that the series isn’t sitting on such a low note!

Zootopia, Ford Motor Company, Smith and Wesson, Cadillac, and the 5th Bomb Wing belong to their respective owners. I own nothing but Captain Hopps and the plot.

Here is the ninth installment of There Is a Time for Every Event Under Heaven: Not Goodbye, Just See You Later.

#

“Attention all units,” Clawhauser’s voice crackled over the radio. “Unit 1023 is engaged in a high speed chase heading eastbound on Grazer Boulevard. Last reported 20 was just past the airport exit. Advise if you can assist.”

“So much for a routine patrol of the Meadowlands,” Nick commented as he made the turn onto Grazer and pressed the accelerator to the floor. The big V-8 roared to life as the automatic transmission quickly ran through the gears, bringing the Fang Police Interceptor Utility to well over 100 mph in no time.

Judy flipped on the lights and siren before picking up the radio pawset. “Dispatch, Unit 403 is eastbound on Grazer two miles west of the airport exit. We are moving to assist.”

“10-4, 403,” Ben responded.

“Who’s got car 1023 today?” Nick asked, his eyes laser focused on the road ahead of him.

“Let’s see,” Judy muttered as she looked through the database in the in-car laptop computer. As she looked she kept an ear on the increased chatter on the radio. Other units were also moving to assist, but it sounded like she and Nick were the closest ones. “Looks like Delgato and Snarlov,” she reported.

“Roger,” Nick acknowleged.

Not much was spoken between the two, only what was absolutely necessary. Both rabbit and fox were mentally preparing themselves for the confrontation to come. As the plains of the Meadowlands raced by outside the window, Judy took the opportunity to pull her sidearm from her holster and gave it one last once over. Of course she had checked it at the precinct before starting the patrol, but it never hurt to double-double check. She had only had to fire it twice in anger, and one of those times it had jammed on her. It was only by the grace of God that the other guy had found himself with an empty magazine. To her knowledge, Nick had never had to use his Smith & Weasel, and neither of them had ever taken a life, but they were both trained and ready. As she put her sidearm back in its holster, Nick spoke.

“Check mine too,” he said simply.

“Yep,” she acknowledged as she pulled his from its holster on the right hip of his Class B uniform and gave it the same inspection she gave hers before slipping it back in place.

“There they are,” Nick said.

Judy looked out the windshield to see a civilian Cattleac CTS stuck nose first in the ditch on the right side of the road, and a Fang Police Interceptor sedan sitting in the middle of the road, generally facing away from them, but cocked at a 45 degree angle to the left. Judy figured the chase itself must have ended in a pit maneuver, sending the suspects’ car into the ditch. Crouched down by the left side of the patrol car was Delgato and Snarlov, their sidearms drawn, and occasionally popping up over the hood or the trunk to get a few shots off. Judy and Nick were driving headlong into a firefight.

BANG! BANG! CRACK! The windshield instantly took the appearance of a massive spiderweb as a stray round struck the bullet resistant glass.

“Judy, stay down! Hang on!” Nick ordered as he continued to approach the scene at high speed before yanking the wheel hard to the right, then pulling the emergency brake and turning the wheel back to the left. The rear end of the SUV came around in a skid before coming to a stop behind Snarlov and Delgato’s cruiser, the rear bumpers facing each other, creating more of a wall between the officers and the bandits. It also meant that the driver’s side was facing the suspect’s car and the hail of bullets that were coming from that direction, so Nick would have to follow Judy out the passenger side.

“Go Carrots, go! I’m following you!” Nick yelled as he tore his service cap from his head and tossed it on the dash while simultaneously drawing his sidearm. Judy threw her door open and scrambled back along the length of the SUV to where Snarlov was crouched down by the left rear fender of his cruiser. As promised, Nick was right behind her.

“How many we dealing with, John?” Judy asked as calmly as she could with bullets whizzing over their heads.

“We’re pretty sure it’s just two.” Snarlov responded. “And thank God you’re here! We’re running low on ammo!”

“Understood,” she acknowledged before turning to her partner crouched down beside her. “Cover me Nick. I’m gonna pop my head up and try to get a bead on where they’re hiding.”

“No need,” John stopped her as he began to raise his head above the trunk to point them out. “They’re both behind their left rear fend- YEOW!” he suddenly screamed and sank back down to the pavement, clutching his left ear.

“John! What happened?!” Delgato asked from where he was sitting by the left front fender.

“I think they got me in the ear!” Snarlov roared. He removed his paw from his ear and looked down at it to see his own blood.

Nick gasped. “They punched a hole clean through it!”

Delgato looked over and saw daylight where part of his partner’s ear should be. He felt a new surge of rage course through his veins. They had hurt his partner. And they were going to pay.

“Matt! There’s a first aid kit in our cruiser-” Judy began but cut herself off when she turned to the lion officer and saw him standing and moving quickly around the hood of the cruiser, firing his sidearm wildly.

“MATT, NO!” John screamed as he watched a spurt of blood exit the lion’s back and he crumpled to the pavement in front of the cruiser, out of John’s view.

“MATT!” Judy screamed in horror. Time seemed to slow down as she watched the lion disappear from view. They needed to end this. Now. She clicked off the safety on her weapon as she turned to face the cruiser. Adrenaline surged through her body as she kicked upward with her powerful rabbit legs, landing on the trunk before immediately leaping up again, over to the roof of her and Nick’s SUV. Somewhere in the background she heard Nick scream her name, but she stayed focused on moving, on making herself as challenging a target as possible. Almost as soon as her feet touched down on the SUV roof, she kicked off once more and landed on the roof of the Cattleac, her weapon already aimed at one of the suspects. The other lay crumpled on the ground. Matt must have gotten him before he went down. “DROP YOUR WEAPON NOW!” she screamed. But the remaining gunman didn’t listen. Of course he didn’t listen. That would’ve been too easy. As he whirled around to target the bunny, she squeezed off one round, and then another for good measure, both kill shots. And just as quickly as it had started, the firefight was over.

Judy suddenly realized how heavily she was breathing as she felt time begin to return to normal. Her sensitive bunny ears were ringing from the gunfire. Her legs began to shake, and she sank to her knees on the roof, trying to gather herself again.

“MATT!”

Judy whipped her head around in the direction of Snarlov’s voice. What she saw was a sight she knew she’d eventually witness if she stayed in this business long enough, but had still prayed she’d never have to see. On the pavement in front of their cruiser, Delgato lay helplessly on his back, while Snarlov desperately tried to stop the blood pouring from the lion’s chest.

Judy scrambled from the roof of the Cattleac and started running to the two cops, but was intercepted by something red and furry before she could get there.

“Oh, Judy! Judy!” Nick cried as he practically tackled her before wrapping her tightly in his arms. “You stupid bunny! Why did you do that!?”

“Nick!” she tried to get his attention as she felt his tail curl around her back.

“That was so stupid and reckless! You could have been killed!”

“Nick!” she tried again as she felt his arms press tighter. So tight that her ribcage started to hurt.

“Don’t you ever do that again! You scared me so bad!”

“NICK!” she yelled as she managed to bring her arms up underneath his and grab his face in her paws, forcing him to look her in the eye. But when emerald locked with amethyst, it forced her to pause for a split second. His eyes were watering, he was panting heavily, and the look of sheer desperation and panic on his face was something she had never seen before on anyone. He was absolutely terrified, not for himself, but for her. The realization almost made her forget what she was trying to tell him, but she quickly refocused. “Nick, I’m okay! I’m right here! I’m fine, but we have to help Matt!”

He didn’t respond for a second or two, continuing to just stare at her. She was about to speak up again when he suddenly reacted, as if his body or mind were on a slight delay. “Right, right! Of course!” he agreed before releasing her from his grip and following her over to the other two officers.

But when Judy and Nick stood over the lion and wolf, they could already see there really wasn’t anything that could be done. Blood already stained the majority of Delgato’s Class C uniform shirt. They watched as John frantically tried to help his partner, fumbling with the first aid kit, oblivious to, or possibly in denial of, the futility of his actions.

“Come on Matt, stay with me!” John was saying as the bunny and fox knelt down next to him. He continued to apply gauze to the hole in his chest, but the blood continued to saturate the bandages to the point of uselessness. In the distance, the wail of sirens began to grow louder and John looked up briefly to see more cop cars approaching before looking back down at the lion. “Help is coming! I called in the ambulance! You just gotta stay with me, Matt! Stay with me!”

Matt coughed and sputtered as he tried to speak around the blood that was filling his lungs. “No…time,” he coughed. “Not…gonna…make it.”

“Don’t you DARE talk like that!” John cried at the lion as he gave up on the bandages and focused on applying pressure to the wound with his paws.

“Tell…Lucy…I…love her,” he continued, wanting to get one last request out before he became too weak to be understandable.

“You can tell her that yourself when you see her tonight!” John declared as Judy put a paw on his shoulder, knowing that the wolf would need a lot of comforting in a moment. “Just stay awake! Matt, stay with me!”

The lion coughed a couple more times before letting out one last, long breath. And then he was still.

“Matt?” John asked quietly. “Matt?!” a little louder. “MATT! NO, MATT! NO! NO!” he continued to scream as the paramedics suddenly arrived and pulled him away so they could examine the now still lion.

“Come on John,” Judy said gently as she and Nick guided the now sobbing wolf away from his partner. They brought him over to the left rear fender of the SUV and let him slide against it down to the hard, unforgiving pavement. “It’s okay John,” she whispered as she and Nick knelt down in front of the wolf. “We’re here. Just let it out.”

“T-this wasn’t – this wasn’t supposed to – h-happen,” the wolf sobbed, wiping his eyes as one of the paramedics, a marmot, began tending to his ear.

“What do you mean?” Judy prodded softly as she watched the tears continue to flatten the fur under his eyes.

“T-they just – ran a – stop sign,” John continued as he lowered his eyes to stare at his paws, the greyish-white fur now stained crimson with his partner’s blood. “I-it was a s-simple traffic stop. I-I was already going to – let them off with a-a warning. B-but they took a – took a shot at me. A-and p-peeled out. N-no one h-had to die. No one had to die.”

Nick and Judy turned from the wolf to look at each other. Not needing to exchange words, their faces told all. Their hearts grieved at the waste.

#

Nick sat on the passenger side floorboard of the SUV in front of the seat, the door hanging open and his feet barely touching the hard blacktop. He held his face in his paws, his elbows supported by his knees, and stared intently at the ground. It was the first moment he had had to himself since the chase began. Shortly after the paramedics had arrived, the sniffer unit had shown up, and he and Judy had worked with them to determine why the suspects had fled after initially being pulled over. The several kilos of catnip they had found underneath the floor of the trunk seemed to be the most likely reason. Judy was still talking with two of the wolves in the unit, wrapping up some of the administrative details. It had been a welcome diversion from dealing with what he had just witnessed an hour or so prior.

But now, he was alone with his thoughts, which came in a jumble as he tried to process it all. Today, he had witnessed a fellow officer, someone he had called a friend these past several months, die right in front of him. No warning. Alive and well one minute and gone the next. It was a first for him. Even though he had spent many years on the streets, he had never had to witness the passing of another mammal.

Of course, intellectually, he knew how dangerous this kind of work was. He knew that the specter of death was a constant in the life of a police officer, but he had never truly felt it until today. But now he realized, it could have easily been him. Or Judy. Judy. He had come this close to losing his partner and best friend today. The rush of pure terror that had overtaken him when he had turned to see the bunny springing from the pavement beside him and into the hail of bullets was something he wouldn’t wish on his worst enemy. He had never felt such raw, unadulterated fear and panic in his entire life. But the weirdest thing was, none of it was for him. He had been afraid entirely for another mammal. In his entire life, he couldn’t remember ever being so afraid for someone else. He knew she meant a lot to him, but just how much was a lot?

His thoughts were interrupted when he noticed a small spot on the pavement become a shade darker than it had been a moment before. Then another. And another. He reached a paw to his face and realized tears were now streaming down it. And that’s when the dam broke. He let out a shuddering sob before breaking down in a fit of weeping and sobbing.

From a few feet away, Judy heard a sob come from the direction of their cruiser. She turned her head to see her partner’s face buried in his paws. Her heart ached when she realized what was happening. She turned back to the two wolves. “I think that about covers it for now,” she cut one of them off. “It’s been a long day and we can take care of the rest tomorrow.”

The wolves nodded in understanding before heading off to their cruiser. She turned back to where her partner sat and regarded him for a moment, contemplating what she could possibly say to comfort him. She wasn’t entirely sure she should even be the one to do it. Like Nick, this was also her first time seeing a fellow officer die. Where would she even begin? “Oh, Nick,” she sighed. She slowly began to make her way over to the cruiser. She still didn’t have a clue what to say, but her partner needed her now. She was just gonna have to trust God on this one.

“Nick?” she whispered once she was a couple steps away from the fox. He didn’t seem to hear her. “Nick?” she tried again a little louder. This time, he heard her. He looked up and stared at her for a second or two before suddenly grabbing her and pulling her into a tight embrace.

“H-he’s dead Judy! I can’t believe he’s dead! A-and then you! I-I was so scared Judy,” he sobbed. “I was so scared! I thought I’d never see you again!” She could feel the vibrations tickle her throat and chin where they rested on his shoulder when he spoke.

“Shh, shh, it’s okay, Nick,” she soothed as she rubbed her paw up and down his back. “I’m okay. I’m right here. Deep breaths. It’s okay. I’m not going anywhere.”

They remained like that for several minutes, just holding each other as he soaked her Kevlar vest with his sobs and she gently rocked them both from side to side, her paw still running up and down his back. She hated seeing him like this. It broke her heart to see her best friend in pain. But if there was any good news in all of this, it was that he was slowly starting to let down the guard he had kept up all these years. She was glad that he was starting to open up to her more. Eventually, his sobs turned to sniffles as the exhaustion of the day’s events started to get to him. She pulled back slightly so she could look him in the eye. Her paws moved from his back to her sides. “Think you can stand?” she asked quietly.

He nodded before standing to his feet on the pavement in front of her. “I’ve been hanging around you too long, Carrots. I’m getting as emotional as you,” he said quietly in a feeble attempt at a joke.

Judy offered him a weak smile, acknowledging one of his coping mechanisms. “Come on,” she said as she started guiding him over to one of the other patrol cars that had arrived in the aftermath of the shootout. “B.J.’s gonna drive the three of us back to the precinct for the debrief and then I think it would be a good idea if we went with John over to see Mrs. Delgato for a little bit. She must be devastated,” she finished quietly.

Nick nodded again. “I don’t know how much help I’ll be with her though. I’m an emotional wreck right now,” he admitted.

“I know, Nick. I know. You don’t have to say anything. I’m sure she’ll just be glad you came.”

#

Nick and Judy had only met Lucy Delgato a handful of times, all of them at ZPD functions that family had been invited to. They didn’t know her very well, but Judy was right about one thing. She was indeed glad that John, Judy, and Nick had come over to see her. And just as Nick had predicted, he hadn’t uttered a syllable other than the “I’m so sorry,” he had whispered when the three of them had greeted her at the front door of the Delgato home. They had been there for about twenty minutes and Judy had been doing most of the talking. The four of them were sitting in the living room, the three officers on the sofa and the lioness in the easy chair. The easy chair was turned at a 90-degree angle to the sofa with the corner of the chair’s left armrest touching the corner of the sofa’s right armrest. Both pieces of furniture faced a simple yet elegant coffee table.

“Your husband was a brave man, Lucy,” Judy comforted, her right paw extended across the small gap between the sofa and easy chair to rest on the lioness’s arm. “A good man. I consider myself blessed to have known him and worked alongside him as long as I did.”

“T-thank you, Judy,” Lucy replied as she dabbed at her eyes with a tissue. “That means a lot to me. I just-” she stopped for a second as she fought back a sob before continuing. “I just can’t believe he’s gone! I-I never even got a chance to say goodbye!” For the most part, the lioness was keeping her composure, but tears were streaming down her face once again.

“I know it’s hard, Lucy, and I can’t imagine what you’re going through,” Judy said quietly as she pulled another tissue out of the tissue box on the coffee table and handed it to her. “But don’t forget, ‘goodbye’ wouldn’t have been the right thing to say anyway. More like ‘see you later.’ You WILL see Matt again, Lucy. You both put your trust in Christ a long time ago. And because of that, he’s in God’s presence right now. At peace in paradise. And whenever God decides to call you home too, you two will have all of forever to be together.”

The lioness wiped her eyes and blew her nose before responding. “I-I know,” she sighed. “I-I KNOW that’s true, but…it’s so hard to FEEL that truth right now.” She sighed as she looked down at her lap. “That probably sounds silly.”

“No, no!” Judy quickly disagreed. “That’s completely understandable. Despite your faith, you’re still a mammal and you have to grapple with imperfect emotions just like the rest of us.”

Lucy looked back up at the rabbit and gave a weak smile at that. “Thank you, Judy. Thank you for understanding. I, um…” She suddenly paused, as if she was hesitant about what she wanted to say next.

“What is it?” Judy prodded after a few seconds.

The lioness sighed before looking straight at Judy. “Judy, I know we don’t know each other all that well. But I can tell you’re a strong Christian woman. Can…can you pray for me?”

Judy looked slightly surprised, though she knew she shouldn’t have been. On the contrary, she should have expected something like this, but the day’s events had her brain fried. “You-you mean right now?” she asked.

“Yes, i-if you don’t mind,” Lucy affirmed quietly.

“Oh, not at all!” Judy quickly agreed.

Nick watched as his partner took the lionesses paw in her right paw as he felt her take his paw in her left. Her fur felt soft and comforting and yet strong and brave in his paw. While he didn’t really put much stock in what they were about to do, the fox knew better than to say something about it in front of the grieving widow. So, he tried to think back to his childhood Sunday School classes and watched his partner for cues on what to do to not make an idiot of himself. It was enough to give him the presence of mind to take John’s paw in his and bow his head with the others.

“Dear Jesus,” Judy began, her voice quiet but confident as well. “We’re hurting right now. We’re grieving the loss of a dear friend. A husband. A man who loved You. Please give us Your divine comfort. Help us to trust in You, to remember that You are in control. Help us to feel Your presence even as we grieve. And thank you Father, that we don’t grieve in the same way as those who have no hope. Thank you that because You died and rose again, and Matt put his faith in You, all who put their faith in You will get to see him again.”

Nick’s ears perked up at that. It was the second time Judy had said something like that and it made the fox think. While he didn’t consider himself a religious person by any means, he had always operated on the assumption that there was some sort of afterlife. Of course, he had never really given any thought to the details of the matter. But now, faced with death for the first time since the passing of his father, he was beginning to wonder. Judy seemed so sure about what she believed. Maybe he should ask her about this?

“And Lord, we pray especially for Lucy,” Judy continued. “She’s hurting the most out of all of us. You tell us in your Word that you’re a father to the fatherless and a protector of widows. We pray that You will protect her heart now, Father. Give her your peace that passes all understanding. Remind her that You are always with her and will always take care of her. Guide her in the days ahead. Thank You for all that You do for us, for your love, and grace, and mercy. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.”

“Amen,” Lucy and John repeated as the four of them raised their heads. But Nick didn’t say anything as he continued to contemplate what Judy had said. He looked over at his partner and became even more confused at what he saw. The hug that Lucy was now giving the rabbit was normal enough given the circumstances, but the expressions on their faces seemed grossly out of place in the melancholy environment. If he didn’t know better, he’d think there was a hint of a smile. Just a minute ago, there had been tears running down those faces. But now they were…happy? What was going on?

“Thank you, Judy,” Lucy whispered as she practically pulled the bunny onto the easy chair with her. “Thank you. I needed that.”

“You feel better?” Judy asked her quietly.

“I do,” the lioness responded. “I feel…peaceful. You’ve lightened my burden a little, Judy. Thank you.”

“Don’t thank me,” she said with a kind smile. “I’m just His servant.”

Nick was now thoroughly confused. He and his partner had a lot to talk about.

#

It was a strange sensation for Nick, sitting in the passenger seat of his pride and joy. He never let anyone drive his Mustang, but he knew his current emotional state left him in no condition to be driving, and since he had driven Judy and himself into work that morning, he had had no choice but to hand over the keys to his partner when they had gotten out of the debrief at the precinct.

He looked over at her as she silently drove through the streets of Savannah Central, heading to his and Pete’s place. They had both decided it would be best if they just head back there, have dinner together, and then Pete could drive her over to her apartment. She hadn’t spoken a word since they had left the Delgato home. He guessed she was just giving him some space to deal with the events of the day on his own. Normally, he would prefer that, but right now, he felt he needed help. Her help. He looked her over in more detail as he tried to think of a way to start the conversation, and ask the many questions he had. Even in her dirtied and blood-stained uniform, she looked…beautiful. He was hesitant to use that word because of what it might imply about his feelings, but it was by far the most appropriate way to describe her at that moment. And it wasn’t just her soft fur or amethyst eyes that made her beautiful. It was also her confidence, her courage, her selflessness, the way she cared for others. Nick could go on and on. He couldn’t imagine the torture it would be to have someone so beautiful ripped out of his life.

She must have felt him staring at her because as they came to a stop at a red light, she turned her head to face him. The look of concern on her face tore at his heartstrings. “You doing okay, Nick?” she asked quietly. “Do…do you want to talk about it at all?”

Nick sighed as he lowered his head to stare at his paws in his lap. He was thankful to her that she had initiated the conversation. He just had to figure out how to continue it. After a few seconds, he finally decided on, “What do you think happens to us when we die?” He had an idea of what her answer might be based on bits and pieces of what he could remember from his exposure to church as a kit, but he wanted to hear it straight from her mouth.

Judy had sort of been expecting a question like this, but she had been debating how she should answer it. She didn’t want to say anything that would upset the already emotionally distraught fox further, but she also cared about him too much to hide the truth from him. “Do you really want to know?” she asked.

He looked back up at her expectantly and nodded.

‘God, guide my words,’ she prayed silently as the light turned green and they began to roll through the intersection. ‘Help me say the right thing.’ “Okay,” she let out a breath. “Well, as a Christian, I believe that our physical bodies are not who we really are. They’re simply a…container, a vessel, if you will, for our souls, which will live on forever, beyond the death of our bodies.”

“So where does the soul go when we die?” Nick asked.

“They go to one of two very real, very literal places,” the bunny cop continued. “Heaven, where we’ll live in paradise in the presence of God, or Hell, where we’ll be eternally separated from God and tortured beyond what we could possibly comprehend.” She paused there, not sure if he wanted more detail beyond that. After a few moments of silence, she got her answer.

“Why wouldn’t God let everyone into Heaven? I thought you Christians believe that God loves everyone.”

His voice was still soft and he sounded genuinely curious. She internally chastised herself for thinking that he might get bitter or angry with her about this subject. She should give him more credit than that. “He DOES love everyone,” she explained. “And He wants everyone to go Heaven, but….” She paused, trying to think of a way to explain. “Think of it this way,” she began again. “If some random mammal off the street who you didn’t know, or worse, someone you DID know who had hurt you and intended to continue hurting you, suddenly knocked on your door and demanded you let them live in your house, would you let them?”

“Of course not,” the fox replied.

“Well, it’s the same way with God,” Judy continued. “Heaven is His home and He’s not going to let someone live with Him in Heaven who doesn’t love Him and want to be with Him while on Earth. And conversely, while on Earth, He’s not going to force His way into your life. He’ll knock, but He’s not going to barge in. I…guess you could say He’s a gentleman in that sense. He’s not going to MAKE you love Him.”

“Hmmm,” he acknowledged, his brain still trying to process everything. “Let’s say for argument’s sake, I accept all of this as true. How do I know when I’ve done enough good to get into Heaven?”

“You CAN’T do enough good to get in, Nick,” Judy replied. “No one can.”

“Huh?” he gave her a thoroughly confused look.

Instead of explaining right away, she asked, “How much do you know about the Easter story?”

Not feeling in the mood to crack an Easter Bunny joke, he responded, “You mean the religious part of the holiday? It has to do with Jesus, right? And His death on the cross?”

“That’s right. You see, God’s standard to get into Heaven is perfection. If we sin just once in our life, that disqualifies us. Of course, no one can meet that standard on their own. We all have limitations, we all make mistakes. So Jesus, God in the flesh, came down to Earth to die on the cross in our place and then rise from the dead three days later. He didn’t have to do that, but He wanted to, because He loves us that much. In Ephesians 2:8-9 it says, ‘For by grace you have been saved through faith; and that not of yourselves, it is the gift of God; not as a result of works, so that no one may boast.’”

“Hm,” he acknowledged. “So what ARE we supposed to do then?”

“Just accept the gift,” she replied. “Believe. Trust in Him for salvation.”

Nick’s brow furrowed and he didn’t say anything as he tried to process what she was telling him. It was a lot to take in. He realized that while he wanted Judy’s help figuring all of this out, figuring out how to respond to what had happened today, he really was too exhausted to give the subject the brainpower it deserved. He was about to tell her as much when she spoke up again.

“I-I’m sorry,” she hurriedly blurted out. Her partner had been quiet for so long that her anxieties had begun welling up in her again, in spite of her efforts to tamp them down.

Nick looked up at her, a puzzled expression on his face. “For what?”

“P-please don’t be angry,” she continued in an attempt to head off an argument. “I-I didn’t mean to start preaching a sermon or anything, I just-”

“Judy.” he cut her off.

She looked over again at him hesitantly.

“Relax, Fluff,” he said as he briefly gave her a weak smile. “I’m not angry. Far from it. I was the one who broached the subject. If I didn’t want to talk about it, I wouldn’t have asked. I respect your beliefs, Judy. They’re what make you, you. And…as corny as it may sound…I like learning more about you,” he finished with another brief smile.

Judy felt a little warmer inside when she heard the last part. She smiled back at him. “Thanks, Nick,” she whispered.

He turned his head to face forward again before continuing. “And maybe someday I’ll be able to believe like you do. Heck, after everything that’s happened today I’m starting to envy the confidence and comfort you seem to get from your beliefs, but…” he sighed before going further. “It’s a lot to take on faith. I’m going to need time to process it all. And your help. My brain is fried right now, but…is it okay if we talk about this again at some point? In the future?”

She smiled broadly at him as she put a paw on his arm. “Of course, Nick. I’d love to.”

He returned her smile before settling himself further into his seat and looking out the windshield again. Soon his eyelids began to feel heavy, the days events having drained him physically as well as emotionally. After a couple minutes he nodded off, and an occasional snore filled the car.

As Judy continued to drive, she considered the conversation she had just had with her best friend. She really cared about Nick and desperately wanted him to experience the joy and freedom she felt as a Christian. So much so that sometimes she would feel frustrated at his lack of faith, but then she would remind herself that while she could and would continue to point him in the right direction, he still had to go at his own pace. And so, she thanked God that he was starting to ask questions of his own accord.

As her mind continued to wander, having little to do since she knew the route back to Nick’s place by heart, a chilling thought suddenly hit her, as if for the first time: Nick wasn’t a Christian. Of course, she had known this intellectually for a long time, but now the implications of this hit home for her in a way that suddenly made her feel physically ill. If it had been Nick to take a bullet in the chest today instead of Matt, the closest friend she had ever had would be separated from her, and most importantly from God, for all eternity. Her eyes began to water as she further realized that if he died in the line of duty, she would be responsible. She had been the one to suggest he join the force. She had been the one to encourage him throughout his time at the Academy. And she was the one who had gotten her brother to help him pass the fitness test that could have gotten him kicked off the force.

What had she done?

Of course, plenty of good had come as a result of Nick becoming a cop. He had newfound self-respect, he was becoming a better person overall, he was helping to make the city a better place, and she got an excuse to see him for hours every day. But was all that really worth it if he died without knowing God? Tears began to cloud her vision slightly as she made the left turn onto Cypress Grove Lane.

No. No, she couldn’t – she wouldn’t – let that happen. Even as her tears were joined by quiet sobs, Judy Hopps made a promise to herself. She would do everything – EVERYTHING – in her power to keep Nicholas Wilde safe. Even if it meant giving up her own life, he had to stay alive.

As she turned into the driveway and pulled into the garage, Nick began to stir in the passenger seat, awakened by the sounds of both his garage door opening and quiet sobs. Concerned, he turned to look at his partner and noticed the fresh tear stains on her cheeks. He placed a paw comfortingly on her arm. “You okay, Judy?”

She shut off the engine and handed him his keys. She took a few deep breaths to calm herself and wiped her eyes, taking a few extra seconds to compose her thoughts. “I…I’ll be okay, Nick,” she said quietly. I just, um…” She knew she couldn’t tell him the promise she just made to herself, but she felt she owed him an explanation for her fresh set of tears. Her eyes lowered to the blood stained tie of his Class B uniform, and that’s when another thought occurred to her. “Listen, Nick, I know how much you like wearing ties, and I know the Class D isn’t the most comfortable uniform we wear, but…just for my peace of mind, can you please start wearing it? I’ll sleep a lot better at night knowing you’ve got a couple inches of Kevlar protecting your chest when we go out on patrol.” She finished with the most pathetic expression she could muster, keeping her ears drooped down behind her head and widening her eyes as big as she could.

Nick smiled down at her. He knew full well she was trying to manipulate him with that expression. “I know what you’re trying to do, Fluff, but you don’t have to. For your peace of mind, of course I’ll wear the Class D from now on. I don’t want you to worry about me.”

If only he knew just how much she was now worrying about him. She brushed the thought aside before giving him a small smile. “Thanks, Nick.”

#

As Nick and Judy emerged from the little hallway leading from the garage into the kitchen on their way to the living room, Judy suddenly stopped short. “What on Earth?” she asked.

Nick looked down at where his partner was looking. Embedded in the kitchen wall about eye level with Judy, was a piece of metal that was sticking out at an odd angle. Nick slowly reached down and gently pried it free, trying not to make the hole in the plaster any bigger. Once he had done so, he held it in his open paw for he and Judy to inspect. They both quickly realized that it wasn’t just a random piece of metal. “These are…”

“…Pete’s pilot wings,” Judy finished in a confused voice.

Specifically, they were the regular sized metal wings that were normally pinned to the Air Force service dress coat. Nick was aware that Pete had pulled all his pins off his coat the other day to take it in to be dry cleaned, and all the other pins like his rank insignia and ribbon rack were still sitting where he had left them on the kitchen counter, but that still didn’t explain how the wings had ended up stuck halfway into his kitchen wall.

The two partners gave each other a quizzical look before slowly continuing towards the living room where they could hear Pete talking, most likely on the phone. They found him sitting on the couch. He was still in his flight suit and his flight boots, the latter of which most aircrew normally didn’t wear when they weren’t flying, and especially not when they left work, Pete included. He looked like he was chewing a big wad of gum, and he had his cell phone pressed to his ear. The TV was on, muted, and tuned to the local news.

“Thanks again, Mary,” he said in a tired voice. “It means a lot that you called. I’m sure you’re probably swamped right now dealing with the Zootopia Times and the local affiliates. I’ll talk to you tomorrow, okay?” A brief pause. “Okay, good night.” He hung up the phone and tossed it on the coffee table in front of him before sticking another piece of gum in his mouth and turning to face his roommate and his sister. “Hey Nick, Judy. How was your day?” he asked in a voice almost completely devoid of emotion. He also failed to notice their bloody uniforms and tear-stained faces.

When Pete turned to face them, the first thing Judy noticed was Pete’s bloodshot eyes and the wet, matted fur beneath them. “Pete, have you been crying?!” Judy exclaimed as she rushed over and sat down on the couch next to her brother, very concerned.

“I…yeah,” Pete admitted in almost a whisper.

“Why? What happened?” she pressed as Nick came and sat down on the other side of her. She couldn’t remember the last time she’d seen her usually confident, emotionally strong (for a rabbit) brother cry, and if she was perfectly honest, it scared her a little.

Pete looked at her, a little surprised, as if she should know why. “You….really don’t know?” he asked after a few seconds.

“Know what?” Nick asked.

Pete didn’t answer for a moment, not really wanting to tell them, as if someone else finding out would make it even more real, even more final. Finally, he sighed before uttering quietly, “We lost a jet today.”

There was a bit of a pause as Nick and Judy tried to process what Pete had just told them. Judy, hoping he didn’t mean what she thought he meant, asked, “What do you mean? Are you saying it’s unaccounted for, or….? She trailed off, not wanting to voice what she was really thinking.

But Pete saved her the trouble. After taking a shuddering breath, he left no doubt what he meant. “I mean it’s now a smoking hole in the ground,” he whispered before resting his elbows on his knees and his eyes on the heels of his paws.

“Oh, no,” Judy breathed. “What happened?”

“Here,” Pete said as he removed his paws from his face and picked up the remote to unmute the TV. “See for yourself.”

“The B-52 was returning from a training mission near Las Haygas and we have been told that there were no bombs or missiles aboard the aircraft at the time of the crash,” the news anchor reported in a voiceover of stock footage of B-52s in flight. Then, the stock footage was replaced with what looked like a cell phone video. “In this amateur footage captured by a civilian aviation enthusiast who was filming from just outside the base perimeter fence, you can see the airplane in a descending left turn toward the runway, before suddenly rolling sharply to the left until the right wing was pointed straight up in the air, and then plummeting to the ground, striking left wing and tail first.”

Judy and Nick gasped as they watched the eight-engine bomber impact the ground and erupt into a massive fireball.

“You could feel the heat from the other side of the flight line,” Pete said quietly, his eyes watering as he watched with them.

“Did… did you see them go down? In person?” Nick asked.

Pete nodded. “It happened so fast,” he whispered. “They didn’t even have time to THINK about punching out.”

“The crew was made up of members of the 69th Bomb Squadron and the Air Force has confirmed this evening that all five crewmembers perished in the crash,” the news anchor continued. “The names are being withheld until 24 hours after the families have been notified. Both flying squadrons at Foxchild, the 55th and 69th Bomb Squadrons, have been grounded while an investigation is conducted, though wing leadership has stated that the 55th Bomb Squadron is still expected to deploy to Guam next month as planned.”

“You know the names?” Judy asked as she placed a paw on her brother’s back.

Pete nodded again.

“Did you know them?” Nick probed carefully.

“The co-pilot,” Pete whispered, a tear running down his cheek. He turned to look his sister in the eye. “It was Jack Ridley’s jet.”

“What?” Judy asked after a moment, not believing her ears. Pete had gone through AFROTC with Jack, been in the same pilot training class as Jack, and had even been roommates with him when they were both stationed at Barksdale. Both Nick and Judy knew how close the bunny pilot and otter pilot were, and couldn’t believe he was just gone.

“Jack’s dead,” Pete confirmed, more tears running down his cheek. Tears aside, Nick was amazed at how well Pete was maintaining his composure, despite how distraught he obviously was. Nothing like the fox had been earlier that afternoon with Judy.

“Oh, Pete,” Judy whispered as she wrapped her brother in a hug. “I’m sorry. I’m so, so sorry.”

“Does Rachel know?” Nick asked. He had met Jack and his wife last month when he, Judy, and Nick had gone out to dinner to welcome the Ridleys to town. Rachel had struck the fox as a brave woman, but something like this was bound to shake her to her core.

“Yeah,” Pete sniffled. “I volunteered to go over there with the chaplain this afternoon. I-I don’t really remember what I said. I mean, I’m sure I stumbled through something, but…I just remember crying for about an hour and a half. I mean, how do you tell your friend’s wife of less than three months that she’s now a widow and her unborn child won’t know their father?”

“Oh, no, she’s pregnant too?” Judy asked.

Pete nodded. “She just found out this week.”

“I’m so sorry Pete,” Nick said, not really knowing what else to say. He realized he was still holding the silver pilot wings in his hand and gently set them down on the coffee table. “I guess…that’s why I found these stuck in the kitchen wall?”

Pete’s eyes suddenly widened, and he immediately began tumbling into an apology. “Oh, geez, yeah, I’m sorry Nick, I was just so angry and upset, and I had a weak moment and I grabbed the first thing I saw and threw it. I’ll talk to the landlord tomorrow and I’ll fix the damage or pay for it myself and-”

Nick held up a paw. “Pete, it’s okay. I get it. We can deal with it later.” The fox knew firsthand about anger getting the better of one’s actions.

Pete looked like he wanted to say something else but decided against it. Judy and Nick looked at each other, both silently agreeing that telling Pete about the shootout could wait until later. They all had enough on their emotional plate as is. So the three of them just sat there in silence for a few minutes, listening to the drone of the news anchor describing what little was currently known about the crash. Eventually, the anchor moved on to the next story in that evening’s line up.

“We move from one sad story to another,” the anchor reported. “Not only did we lose five American airmen today, but we also lost one of the Zootopia Police Department’s finest. Earlier this afternoon, the ZPD engaged a band of what turned out to be drug smugglers in a high speed chase down Grazer Boulevard just south of Zootopia International Airport. The chase ended when police were able to spin out the suspects car, sending it off the road. However, the suspects then began shooting at the officers, resulting in the death of four year ZPD veteran Matthew Delgato. Both suspects were killed in the shootout, and preliminary reports indicate that Officer Delgato was responsible for one of the suspects’ deaths while Officer Judith Hopps was responsible for the other.”

Of course, as soon as the bunny cop’s name was mentioned, Nick and Judy knew the jig was up, so they turned their attention to Pete to see what his reaction was. His eyes had widened and his mouth hung open slightly as he processed what he had just heard. He muted the TV again and slowly turned to the two cops.

“I am so, so sorry you guys,” he finally said slowly. “I had no idea, though I guess the blood on your uniforms should have been a clue. Here I am unloading my troubles on you and-I’m really sorry,” he finished.

“It’s okay, Pete,” Nick reassured. “You didn’t know.”

Pete nodded before turning to his sister. “So… you had to take a life today?”

Judy simply nodded.

“How are you holding up?” the bunny pilot asked quietly.

“It’s still a little surreal, but… I think I’ll be okay,” she answered in an equally quiet tone.

Pete nodded again and waited a few seconds before asking his next question, hesitant about probing too far. “How… how well did you know the officer?” He didn’t have to say which officer. They all knew who he meant. The dead one.

“Pretty well,” Nick replied this time. “We’ve worked with Matt and John quite a bit. They were one of the first to really make me feel like a part of the ZPD family.”

“We went over to see his wife this afternoon,” Judy continued. “She asked me to pray for her.”

Pete gave a weak smile. “So he was a Christian, I take it?”

“In every sense of the word,” Judy responded. A thought occurred to her. “What about Jack?” she asked slowly. Though she had met the otter pilot several times, the topic of faith had never come up.

Pete visibly stiffened at her question and he lowered his head and stared at his boots for several seconds. He let out a sniffle. He clenched and unclenched his paws a few times. Yet he remained silent.

Nick looked at Judy briefly, wondering if he should say something, but she continued to look at her brother. He turned back to his roommate and decided to take a chance. “Pete?” he asked in a barely audible whisper.

When the pilot looked back up at both of them, fresh tears were streaming down his face. When he spoke, his voice cracked. “I-I don’t know,” he whispered quietly.

“What do you-” Judy started to ask, but was cut off.

“I don’t know!” Pete suddenly yelled before breaking down into sobs. “My friend for close to ten years and I never had the guts to TRY to ask where he stood with Christ! He went to church with me a handful of times, but-” the bunny pilot didn’t finish the sentence as his sobbing intensified to the point that forming words was impossible.

“Oh Pete,” Judy whispered as she pulled the bunny airman’s head to her shoulder and began to rub a paw up and down his back.

As Pete continued to sob onto his sister’s shoulder, Nick tried to process everything that he had learned since walking into the house. His roommate had lost a dear friend, and he was obviously seriously affected by it, yet he had only really broken down when the subject of Jack’s unknown religious status had come up. Thinking back to what Judy had said in the car earlier, he realized that Pete was considering the distinct possibility that Jack Ridley had just been separated from God for all eternity.

The fox now had a newfound respect for the sight in front of him. He knew that their faith was a major part of Pete and Judy’s lives – Judy for one had mentioned to him on numerous occasions that she prayed for him about various things going on in his life – but he had never realized before just how seriously these two bunnies took their faith. They REALLY BELIEVED what they said, and all the consequences that went along with it. And he couldn’t help but respect them for that.

However, though he now knew why his roommate was so upset, he realized he didn’t know how to comfort him. He wished he could remember more from his days as a kit in Sunday School, maybe some Christian belief that could make the bunny pilot feel more peaceful.

Wait a minute. Peaceful. Wasn’t that what Lucy Delgato had said after Judy had prayed this afternoon? Didn’t she say she felt peaceful? Like her burden had been lightened? Maybe that was it. Maybe all they had to do was pray.

And without a moment’s hesitation, he spoke. “Should we pray?”

The two bunnies turned to look at him, shocked expressions on their faces. Pete a little less so, since he was still trying to get the tears under control, but the surprise on his face was still noticeable. They stared at the fox for several seconds in silence before Judy finally uttered a quiet, “What?”

Nick suddenly felt self-conscious as he realized just how out of left field his question must have seemed, especially coming from him. He began stumbling over himself, trying to explain. “I-it’s just that, um, Judy, when you prayed this afternoon – for Lucy – it seemed like, er, no, she said that she felt, uh, peaceful, like, like her burden had been lightened, and I just, um, thought that, you know, since you two believe in…that, that maybe it would help? Here? Now?”

The two bunnies stared at the fox for a few more seconds after he finished before the weakest of smiles began to cross Pete’s face. “Nick,” he said as he wiped his eyes, “that’s the best idea I’ve heard all day. Let’s do it.”

Pete took one of his sister’s paws in his own, and just like this afternoon, Judy took Nick’s in her other paw, smiling up at him briefly as she did so. He returned her smile before the three bowed their heads and Pete began.

“Dear Jesus, we thank You for who You are. We thank You that You are all-loving, that You comfort us in times of trouble. We need your comfort now, Lord. We have lost good friends today, their lives cut short in service to their community and their country. We pray Father, that You will give us peace and guide us as we grieve in the days ahead. Help us to remember that You promise to cause all things to work together for the good of those who love You, who are called according to Your purpose. Thank You God that we don’t have to grieve for Officer Delgato in the same way as those who have no hope. Thank You that because he put his trust in You, he is with You now in paradise. And Lord-” his voice wavered, and he struggled to maintain control. “Lord, Jack is-” his voice cracked. “Jesus, Jack is-” he croaked before starting to sob quietly. Judy squeezed his paw before jumping in, knowing what he was trying to say.

“Lord, we know that You work outside of time,” the bunny cop prayed. “You created it and are above it. And so we pray that at some point before he left this Earth, that Jack Ridley made the decision to put his trust for salvation in You. Please comfort all of us who feel the pain of these deaths, Father. Comfort Rachel and Lucy tonight, as they go through their first night without their husbands. Give them Your peace. Comfort the men and women of Precinct 1 and the 5th Bomb Wing as we mourn and process these tragedies. Give us the courage to get back up and continue to do what is necessary to protect and serve this community and this country. Keep us safe-” now her voice wavered, as her thoughts turned to her promise to herself to keep Nick safe. She felt both males squeeze her paws in reassurance, and she squeezed back and continued after a moment’s pause. “Keep Nick and I safe as we patrol this city we call home and keep Pete and his crew safe as they fly to protect the freedoms you have given us. Help us to remember that you are always with us and always take care of us. Thank You for all that You do for us, for your love, and grace, and mercy. In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, Amen.”

“Amen,” Pete repeated as the three of them raised their heads and released each other’s paws. “Thank you for suggesting that, Nick,” the bunny pilot said as he wiped his eyes. “I needed that.”

Nick nodded. “Do you feel better?”

“I do,” Pete smiled. “Not great, but better. And thank you for stepping in, Judy. I really appreciate it.”

“Of course,” she whispered.

It was then that a low grumbling sound briefly filled the room. Nick looked down at his stomach as he realized how late it had gotten and how hungry he was. He looked back up at the two rabbits. “Well, I don’t know about you two, but I’m in no mood to cook right now, so why don’t I just order us a pizza and we’ll call it good for tonight?”

The two siblings nodded at him and he stood to walk into the kitchen to make the call. As he got to the kitchen counter and picked up the landline phone, he noticed what looked like a business card sitting next to the phone cradle. He picked it up to read it. At the top was the name Chaplain (Maj) Mark Lanolin, USAF and his e-mail address and phone number. Underneath was a Bible verse, Revelation 21:4, “and He will wipe away every tear from their eyes; and there will no longer be any death; there will no longer be any mourning, or crying, or pain; the first things have passed away.” Nick figured that the chaplain had given the card to Pete at some point that afternoon when they had been visiting Rachel Ridley. He read the verse a few more times before sighing and tossing the card back on the counter. “I’ll believe it when I see it,” he muttered as he started dialing.

#

Author’s Note: Oh, Nick. Seeing isn’t believing. Believing is seeing.

I know, like I said, some really deep subjects. I hope I didn’t depress anyone too much, but if you read the first several verses of Ecclesiastes 3, which is where the title for this series comes from, you’ll see that one of the things it says there is a time for, is a time to die. I thought it would be appropriate to include a story dealing with the subject in a slice of life series like this.

There was also a fair bit of conversation regarding life after death and salvation. If you have any questions about anything that was said, or want to talk about it, or were confused by any of it, please, PLEASE, reach out and ask me. I realize it’s a subject that many people aren’t comfortable talking about, but I believe it is an immeasurably important subject, and one that needs to be addressed in every person’s life.

Something I have grappled with (and a question that was raised in a review) in translating Christianity into the world of Zootopia is how Biblical events would have worked with mammals of various species. To give you an idea of what I mean, the most common question I’ve asked myself is, what species would Jesus have been (after all, He is described as both the LAMB of God and the LION of Judah)? My solution to this might seem like a bit of a cop out, but I have decided that since I have no plans to discuss any subjects where species dynamics in Biblical times would be an important issue, I do not plan to establish what species any Biblical person would be. I will leave that up to your interpretation.

I’d also like to point out that Jack Ridley was a reference to the real life U.S. Air Force test pilot and engineer of the same name who most notably worked with Chuck Yeager on the supersonic X-1 project. He was also killed early in life in a plane crash when his C-47 went down northwest of Tokyo in the late ‘50s. You may remember my fictional version of Ridley from the very first installment in this series in which he and Pete exchanged a few lines from the film “The Right Stuff” regarding Beeman’s chewing gum.

In the story, I mentioned Pete wearing flight boots. My headcannon regarding footwear in the world of Zootopia is that it is similar to wearing a hat in our world. By this I mean that some jobs might require footwear, or some wear it as a style choice (Gazelle being a prominent example in the film), but it is not a required clothing item for everyday life.

The next installment should be a lot cheerier, and like I said, I’m hoping to get it out as soon as possible so the series isn’t sitting on such a downer.

Until next time, please review/favorite/follow, ask questions if you have them, and may God bless you all!


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